Death Game
"AAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHH!!!"
"WHAT - THE - FUCK!!!??"
"Hang on to something!" Mist calls, but there's nothing to hang on to.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!" Neo and Ronin scream at the same time, cartwheeling through the air beside me.
I reach out midair and grab Neo's arm, holding him still, albeit upside down. Thankfully, I'm falling feet first, but the dark walls are going by too fast for me to do anything.
Wind lashes against my skin as we plummet. I would scream, but I'm too busy trying to stop myself from puking up my insides.
And in the next second, I feel the strangest feeling.
"Sword!!" Mist yells, her voice sounding faraway.
"DON'T GET SPLIT UP!!" Artee's voice pierces through. "HANG ON TO EACH OTHER!!"
Elemental reaches out and grabs a handful of my collar midair, choking me.
Artee grabs Ronin, who snags Kino. Mist reaches out between Kino and me, and grabs a handful of Kino's hair, who starts to protest.
"Grab my hand…!" she says, stretching out hers towards me.
I reach out, but there's barely a few inches between us. Then, suddenly, it feels like something shifts around us, my body gets propelled on its own, and Mist starts flying in the opposite direction.
"GUYS!!" Artee yells.
They disappear rapidly into the dark, and the world turns into a whirling blur of grey and black. All I can feel is my hand clamped around Neo's arm, and Elemental's grip on my already torn shirt.
For a few seconds, it feels like I'm being tossed around in a washing machine, then I slam against something painful and solid, and every bone in my body grinds in protest.
My vision swims and my skull throbs. My head falls backward onto solid ground with a thump.
"Uwwek," Neo says somewhere to my left, and then throws up.
Besides me, Elemental falls slowly onto his back, panting raggedly and coughing.
We lie there, struggling waiting for the aftershock clears up. Eventually I prop myself groggily onto my elbows.
"What the fuck was that?" I demand, voice bouncing in pitch.
"Don't talk to me," Elemental warbles, clasping his throat. "I'm dying."
"I'm dead," Neo says, lying flat on his face.
"Where's the others?" I ask, ignoring Neo.
Climbing shakily to my feet, Elemental pushes himself up using my shoulder.
"Don't know."
I glance at him. His face looks even more pale and strained in the dim blue light, and there are huge black welts under his eyes from exhaustion.
I'm surprised he hasn't collapsed yet from hunger and fatigue with that normal human body of his.
"Any idea what just happened?" I ask, looking around, and seeing that we're in a completely new part of the cavern.
It's littered with huge boulders mixed with smaller rocks everywhere, built up into piles all around, like something blew up and the cave collapsed.
"Did a cave-in happen?" I wonder aloud.
"Couldn't care less?" Neo rasps, like he's been gargling with sandpaper. "Shouldn't be asking what the heck that spatial warp was?"
"…the Labyrinth…?" Elemental murmurs.
"What? Like a maze?"
"…in… in a myth, there was this maze built by a king under an island, which shifts and changes without warning. You can be walking in one section at some point, then suddenly get thrown into another or get crushed by the walls…"
"Oh," I say, bewildered. "I see."
Never crossed my mind that Elemental was the type of guy to get into all those pointless myths and legends - he didn't exactly strike me as someone who'd be poring over old texts all the time.
"Never heard it before."
For a second, he stares at me, and I catch a strange look in his eyes. Then it's gone and he says,
"Yeah, you won't've heard of it. It's not a well-known myth."
"So you're saying this place is like the Labyrinth of your… myths? Shifts places randomly at different times?"
"Yes," he agrees. "Though we still don't know anything. How large this place is, where we are, whether or not this is the same cave, where the others ended up…"
Suddenly, next to us, Neo springs up.
"Neo?"
"I heard something," he says. "While I was lying down just now, I felt like a tremor-"
Then the whole place starts shaking, and a terrible, ghastly rumbling reaches my ears.
"Get ready," Elemental says, voice quavering because of the shaking.
"The hell is this now?" I curse.
Then the whole mountain of rubble behind us fucking explodes.
A wedge of obsidian crystal as big as my body explodes up in a shower of rocks, and we dash back out of the range of the downpour.
"Cut us a damn break!"
If that thing's what I think it is, we're dead meat all over again.
"CC!?" Neo demands, sprinting alongside me.
"You fuckin - don't jinx it you piece of shi-"
Behind us, the rest of the body pulls itself out behind the black wedge-head, its front split open into a double-hinged jaw with interlocking blades of shimmering red quartz.
A massive serpentine body rears up after it, its armoured segments endlessly clanking and grinding against each other.
Behind its jaws, a frill of needle-thin crystal spines rise and fold like a fan, and greenish saliva drips from its maw. It emerges fully and stares down at us with hundreds of beady red eyes.
On its underbelly, through the segmented armour, glimpses of flesh show through - dark, sinewy muscle streaked with glowing mineral threads. Each of its limbs, twice as thick as my arm and three times my height, end in glassy talons.
Scorpio Crystallinus, the Crystalline Crawler.
"Man," I say to Neo. "You jinxed it again, sonuvabitch."
The thing screeches, blasting me full in the face with a hurricane of foul breath.
Clearly, dental hygiene is none-existent down here.
"Do we fight it?" Elemental asks, assuming a stance.
I grab him by the hair and pull him behind me like luggage.
"RUN YOU DUMBASS!!!!!!!!"
The CC can't be compared to a fat leech. The CC's in a whole different league - not a predator, but a freak of nature. It should be super rare to come across one in the wild so WHY IS ONE HERE!?!?!?!
It bears down on me from behind and in seconds its breath is on my back.
I'm dead.
I wonder how many times I've thought that in the last two weeks.
I squeeze my eyes shut as I hear its jaws open.
"YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!"
Last time I checked, CCs don't shout like that.
Behind me, the head that was poised to rip me to shreds suddenly slams into the ground, and the rest of the body behind it follows, armour segments smashing against each other in a deafening noise as it comes juddering to an abrupt halt.
I turn, dive to the ground out of its range, and watch a human being stand up on the Crawler's head.
"Who…?" Neo begins, but then he gets cut off with a booming clang.
It's the sound of metal striking the Crawler's carapace, as the guy standing on its head raises an arm, bulging with muscle and laced with veins, and brings it down in a brutal punch between the bug's eyes. Then he punches it again. And again. Again. Every time his fist moves, there's the glint of metal.
Knuckledusters. There's a guy fighting a CC with a pair of brass knuckles. The bug's steel-like carapace is splintering under his onslaught, and then explodes.
Shards of rocky armour spray upwards and clatter across the cave ground.
"Let's move!" I tell Elemental and Neo, and we scramble to our feet and pull back further away from the fight.
The armour on top of the bug's head has been completely smashed, exposing a writhing mass of flesh within, but just before the attacker can pull through with a follow-up move it seems to remember that it's a multi-ton super-insect. It rears up, long-ass body undulating and writhing violently behind it, crashing against the boulders, cave roof and floor, dislodging stalactites and stalagmites.
"Dodge!"
I have to dive out the way before I'm impaled on a flying shard of stone but the guy on its head is somehow still there. He's clinging on by his fingertips, and draws back a hand, plunging it deep into the bug's cranium.
With a cascade of purple blood he tears out a handful of gooey stuff. The bug is now writhing back and forth in all directions, blood running into its eyes, emitting a thunderous screeching coupled with the crashing and booming.
Literally, I don't even know what's going on anymore.
Eventually, after what seems like an age of punching, clawing, tearing and violence, the giant bug stops moving and crashes to the ground in a storm of dust. Coughing, I peer through the haze and make out the figure of the guy who's just punched a Crystalline Crawler to death standing up slowly on the corpse.
"Careful," Elemental says, eyes steady but glinting dangerously, as he stands in front of us.
I glance at him, and although he seems calm I can tell he is nervous. No surprises there. Me too. Will this monstrous guy turn on us, like that Exqua…?
The dust clears and we get a good look at him. Tall, broad-shouldered, chiselled with muscle and blood-spattered steel knuckledusters. Short blonde hair with shaved side burns, an ashen face covered with grime and dried blood, and a pair of scary green eyes.
I shiver slightly. they're locked straight with mine and filled with evil intentions.
"Yeah," I say. "I don't think he's friendly."
"Who are you?" Elemental asks.
"None of ya biz," the guy grins. "Cuz ya'll dead."
Then he ejects himself off the smashed-in head of the Crawler, and sails through the air right at me.
One second he's twenty feet away, next he's here. The first swing misses my face by inches and I backstep out of range. He chases, fists hurtling through the air at me, forcing me to keep backing up. Elemental intercepts, dodges a swipe that probably would've taken off his head, pivots and grabs his wrist. He twists, but the muscleman tears through the grip with raw strength, spins and counters with a heaving hook.
I lunge in and deflect the punch with both my forearms, the shock leaving both my hands numb.
Me and 004 back up as our opponent stretches his arms.
"One hit from those knuckledusters and we're dead," I tell Elemental.
Stay calm. Focus on your opponent. Think only about surviving.
"How can he move that fast with that huge frame?" Elemental mutters, lowering his centre of gravity, feet shifting into position.
"I know right? But-"
The opponent rushes in, driving a knee forwards. Elemental sidesteps it in a split second and scores an elbow to the ribs, and follows up with a sharp punch to the jaw that would've put anyone to sleep.
"-we're faster."
Except it did nothing. Like hitting a wall.
"Tag in!" Elemental shouts to me and Neo, but I find that I'm the only one rushing forwards.
Neo's struggling to stand, his leg shaking and trailing blood. He must've been struck by the flying rubble earlier. Grabbing a stray shard of rock from the cave floor, I charge towards the two of them fighting, feeling the world go streaky as my inhuman, enhanced muscles propel me forwards.
I swing with everything I have. His eyes widen, and the stone disintegrates on impact and blood sprays onto my face.
"Wha-"
My fingers go numb again. The monstrous guy in front of me starts grinning through a haze of blood, and a vice-like grip tightens on my collar.
Shit.
But before he can throw me, Elemental slams a kick into his temple and the grip loosens. Pulling myself free, we circle him like hunters.
We have two advantages in this brawl. We're fighting 2v1ing him and we're faster, but we're stuck at a complete deadlock. Neither side can deal any proper damage to the other.
It's true. That kick from 004 would've been an instant lights-out for Neo or maybe me, but this guy just stumbles a little. He reminds me of the batsman a little.
"Damn!"
I clench my fingers and hit him, again, again, and again. His skin splits under my knuckles but he just keeps coming. Every hit feels like punching a solid brick wall. How can a human even have this kind of physique? He's grinning, and laughing, and for a second I realize he's enjoying this.
That kinda pisses me off.
I was scared of this idiot? Don't play jokes with me. Compared to those guys with the metal bats that killed Kard, this meathead's nothing.
A rush of blood goes to my head, and suddenly I just wanna hit him. To hell with dodging. To hell with all that fancy stuff. I'll just destroy him.
The look in his eyes change.
"Oh?"
My knuckles collide with his sinuses.
It feels good, and I feel his flesh bending around my fist. I push through and he reels back, blood spurting from between his eyes.
He's still grinning. As he draws back an arm to hit me, I sweep him in the legs and he loses balance. I step into the next attack with grunt, and bash him on the nose.
This time, he stumbles and falls flat on his back.
"Still having fun?" I ask.
He starts shaking. At first, I think that he's having a seizure until I realize he's laughing.
"You bet," he grins crazily.
Ah, shit.
He rears up of the ground and in half a second the knuckledusters flash in front of my eyes. At the same time, Elemental grabs my shirt from behind and yanks me backwards, the cold metal barely missing me.
"Don't go in so carelessly," Elemental reprimands. "You're copying him."
He's right. Our opponent ignores our hits - but unlike the masked batter, he's taking damage. It's not that he's invulnerable, but he just doesn't care about his body.
It's scary. Cuz when you're fighting someone completely unafraid of getting hit you can only be sure you've won when you… kill him.
"WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR!?" muscleman calls from a few feet away. "If you won't come to me, I'll come to you!"
He dashes at us and Elemental rushes to meet him, but seconds before collision a new voice rings out that makes us all freeze.
"STOP!!"
I whirl around and there's a new person kneeling above us on a nearby boulder
"Luc, BACK OFF!!" he yells. "Quit fighting everyone you see!!"
He jumps down from the boulder and lands lightly close by.
The musclehead spits onto the floor and rolls his eyes, but stays put.
"Who the hell are you?" Elemental demands, looking between them.
"010, Krim. Nice to meet you."
"007 Sword," I say. "This is 004, Elemental. You gonna tell us why this gorilla is going after us?"
"Uh, he has violent tendencies," the newcomer decides. "He's not a bad guy."
"He tried to kill us."
"He does that."
I raise an eyebrow at the new guy, then back at the musclehead.
Now that he's closer to us, in the light, I get a better look at him. He's slightly shorter than me with a well-honed, athletic-looking build, though nowhere near as ripped as the musclehead. A mop of messy, rust-coloured hair tops a slightly dark-skinned face, with strange, reddish-brown eyes. More people appear from the boulders, about five or six in total, and approach us.
"Luc," he says, exhaling. "Please."
The meathead grumbles, but finally lowers his fists.
"Listen to big bro," I tell him despite myself.
"Oh yeah?" He demands. "Wanna go for another round? I'll lay you out again, punk."
"Let's do it then," I say, squaring up to his face. "Can't wait to split one in your face again."
Elemental pushes apart.
"Didn't know you had that side," 004 mutters to me.
"What?"
"Nothing, forget it."
He turns to Krim and his group.
"Feels like you've got quite alot on your hands."
"Tell me about it," he sighs. "You have no idea. The muscle-brain is Luc, he doesn't offer much besides ego and punches, and he's 009."
"Did you come up together?"
"Yeah. I would've ditched him."
"You didn't cuz you know you can't do anything without me," Luc grins, puffing out his chest.
Krim introduces us to the rest of his group - 023 Cinder, 024 Diva, 034 Leon, 055 Kite and 092 Jora, and it becomes evident he's the leading figure.
"We picked up these two just a few minutes ago after the crazy shifting thing," he says, nodding at Cinder and Diva. "If you don't mind you can stick with us too."
"Our pleasure," Neo groans from the floor.
We keep moving through the cavern, trying to find a way out of the collapsed cave, Elemental and Leon supporting Neo between them.
As we do, I notice that all of them had weapons of some sort. Crude wooden swords, razors, blunt or rusting knives, and Luc's knuckledusters.
"We actually don't know," Krim says when I ask him. "We were attacked by a group of three that were carrying these, and two of our members were killed. We were able to get the better of them though."
"Pah!" Luc laughs. "Don't make it sound like a fight. We slaughtered them."
"For real," Leon agrees, fingering his hatchet. "Bitches jumped us just after the crazy bat guys rampaged through the survivors."
"You killed them?" I ask in surprise.
It dawns on me I'm talking to a murderer.
"Yes," he says. "We did. We also got these off them."
He digs around in a battered leather pouch on his waist and hands me a flat piece of bread. I snarf it down instantly, and despite being drier than Elemental's personality it tastes like heaven. A dead man's food.
"How did it feel?" I ask later. "Killing someone?"
He glances at me sharply.
"Don't tell me you haven't prepared to do that yet? Y'know there are crazies in here that'll stick you with a knife for some crumbs, right?"
"Nah," I lie. "Of course I have. I'm not stupid."
Krim studies me for a moment.
"Yes," he decides. "Cuz if you wanna make it out of this crappy death game, you have no choice."