Super Paint Brawl: In the Empire's Shadow

[Hat Salesman]

Bewm.

[Grimscott]

Aug 2, 2008 21:44:13 GMT -5 Balto-Boy said:

She looked up to see the rugged, tired face of the man carrying her. Scars littered his face and one of his large, red eyes was no longer able to stay open.

Aug 2, 2008 21:44:13 GMT -5 Balto-Boy said:

The man wore a mask over his mouth. He had a deep, red scar across his eye

Good gravy, I must have a secret fetish for fellows with wounded eyes.

[McJesus]

*jumps and claps in joy*
Loving every letter!

[Aperaptor]

I didn't even knew this existed.....

[Balto-Boy]

Chapter 11: Advancement

She was now carried by her mother from under her arm. Her brother was there, too; clutching to the mother's other hand. The third child was running on his own between the mother and the grisly, red-eyed man. The other person was running to the side of the mother, but the creature that teamed with the group before was no where to be seen.

They all frantically sprinted to the entrance of the building they have just entered. Some were hopping over a desk and pushing aside displays that showed off fragile items to the ground. The red-eyed figure, who ran in front, stopped momentarily once he reached the front door. Impatient, he quickly raised his hands and shot at the door's hindges as he did previously. Once the door fell to the ground, however, the figure reeled back as his eyes met a crowd of zombies outside.

The figure swore as he told the others to turn around while he did likewise. Again, they glaced upon a group of zombies, where the large, bulky creature grunted and moved oddly from the very back.

She looked to her mother. "Mommy, what's wrong with Mr. Apple?"

The mother stared back to the new crowd as she answered her daughter.
"Mr. Apple is uh... Mr. Apple is very sick right now..."

After that, the mother turned her head behind her.
"Omni! What are we going to do now?!"

The red-eyed figured concentrated to his front.
"I'm working on it!" he yelled as furies of purple fire smashed into zombies in front of him.

The figure with the large ponytail brought out a sword and started to slice at the zombies once more. The red-eyed figure continued blasting at the zombies in front of him and the children crowded around the mother, who stood between the other two.

One of them started to bawl. The mother looked around frantically, searching for an option. Eventually, she put her daughter down to her brother.
"Hold her up and keep her off of her bad leg," the mother ordered.

After that, she pulled a scythe off of her back and readied it. Occasionly, as she cautiously looked around her, the mother sliced at any zombie that was unwise enough to get close to her and her children. The children, extremely frightened, looked on at their warring parents. The three older figures held off the zombies for as long as possible, but the monsters kept coming in closer and closer as the red-eyed and ponytailed figures were being pushed back inside farther and farther. Now, the mother was swinging her scythe as fast as ever and the group was reduced to a tiny circle.

As they all had no more room, as their struggle appeared to be futile, and as their hope drained, there was a comotion outside. From the large storefront window, they could see a pair plowing over the zombies from outside: a muscular, grey-skinned behemoth of a beast; and a much smaller, dog-like creature blasting greenish rays from a dirty-golden right glove.

------------------------------------------------------

Grimpresence and AJ emerged from the training room and into the main room of the headquarters. From the room next to them, Nick emerged angrily, earphones blaring. Nick started to yell at AJ about how his room was now "totally trashed" as Grimpresence quietly waited behind AJ, who only looked back calmly and sternly. When Nick ranted about

how he can't sleep with a "gigantic fucking hole" in the wall, AJ brushed him off with her story about how Grimpresence is about to get her powers back. Nick seemed to calm, but only a little. Harsh words were exchanged, but AJ apparently won because it was Nick who backed off and went back to the room where he originally was. AJ and Grimpresence continued to walk to the main room afterwards.

The majority of the people were at the table where the radio blared what noise was currently surrounding Donkoo.

Only McJunior and Scondie were elsewhere; McJunior worked on a computer as Scondie helped. Grimpresence and AJ walked up next to Blue; who sat near the table with Omniscott, Yarameh, and Zugal.

"Hey, girls," Blue greeted them. "How's the training going?"

"I wouldn't say it's too bad," AJ said in her usual, slightly-monotone voice.

"I'd say it's great!" Grimpresence said exitedly. "I finally figured out how to do this fire thing!"

Grimpresence held out her right hand in front of her and flicked it up and down. Each motion produced small, purple

sparks and sputters of flames, but nothing grand. Grimpresence gave off frustrated noises with each motion as each flick of the wrist grew quicker and quicker.

"No, wait..." Grimpresence said at the first flick. "Oh... I got it... wait... argh... oh, come ooooooon...!"

AJ watched smuggly and eventually held out an arm to stop Grimpresence.
"We'll get there eventually," she said to both Grimpresence and Blue.

"Well, good," Blue replied. He then turned to McJunior and yelled a question.

"Hey! It's going to the General station place, right?"

"So far..." McJunior said without looking back. "Can't really make any true garuntees, as of yet."

"Oh, okay then," Blue huffed. He turned back to the radio and listened with the other three sitting. Right now, not much was heard; just the noise of the convoy gliding over the ground.

"What's going on with all of this anyways?" Grimpresence asked the group.

"Oh, there was a funny little thing going on while you were asleep," Zugal answered.

"Yeah! That dude was scared shitless!" Yarameh interupted. "It was was awesome..."

"Wait, what?" Grimpresence wondered, still confused. "What 'dude'?"

Omniscott turned to look at Grimpresence.
"A virus that was still alive outside in that wreckage. We figured a spy might come in handy. With all the trouble we caused as of late, we can't exactly waltz back in there to find what we want."

"A military virus?" Grimpresence asked, her voice slightly elevated.

"Umm... of course," Omniscott replied.

Grimpresence quickly looked both worried and excited, which was a mood that had the others confused.
"What was the name?!"

Omniscott was taken aback but the sudden enthusiasm, but answered nonetheless.
"It was, uh... the name was 'Donkoo'. Private Donkoo."

"Donkoo??? Are you sure?!"

"Well, that's what the nametag said," Omniscott answsered skeptically.

A few folks oddly looked on to Grimpresence has she started to bounce a bit in excitement.

"...what's so important about this anyways?" Omniscott wondered.

"Donkoo," Grimpresence started. "I knew that virus. We were friends back in Mylok!"

In an erie coincidence, the room listening to Grimpresence echoed "What?!" at the exact same moment.

"Yeah!" Grimpresence continued. "Well, sorta. Donkoo's a friend of my boyfriend."

"You... you had a virus boyfriend, now?" Blue asked in a bit of shock. Others were looking to her, probably just as shocked as Blue was.

"Yeeeeah... what's so odd about that?" Grimpresence asked.

"Well you aren't exactly a virus," Blue explained. "You'd think the guy would notice."

"Oh, Grim..." Yarameh started as he raised up hands to perform arbitrary gestures. "You two didn't... uh... um, y'know..."

"What? NO!" Grimpresence screeched. "You sick bastard...!"

Omniscott immediately turned to the embarrassed Yarameh to look him dead in the eye. He immediately lifted a hand up and slapped Yarameh in the back of the head.

"Hey, out of curiousity," Omniscott added. "What was the guy's name?"

"Oh, what a tough guy..." Grimpresence started off. "Anyways, the guy is a SWAT sargeant. I always used the first name, Monda, but that guy absolutely hated that and almost forced me to use 'Kkang'."

*****

Donkoo, who was behind the convoy's wheel, looked down to the helmet when it thought it heard a familiar name from the helmet's speaker. Keeping two of its hands on the steering wheel, Donkoo used the other pair to shift the battle-tarnished helmet back to its head.

"Hey! What are you talking about over there?"

Omniscott's voice cracked over the radio once again. "Oh, that new recruit I mentioned before. She apparently knows you and a buddy of yours."

A noise was heard from Omniscott's end of the radio. It sounded like something was being knocked to the ground.

Omniscott's voice was now fainter than before, but it was heard grumbling at something.

Now, another voice came over the helmet's radio.
"Donkoo?! Hi!"

Donkoo was too stunned for words for a moment. Its subconcious drove the car as the virus's mind became as blank as the look on its face. An awkward silence later, Donkoo spoke again, still driving.

"Muh-muh-Maytak??? Is that seriously you?"

"Of course it's me, you loon!" Grimpresence said with enthusiasm. "Who else would it be? It's good to talk to you again!"

Donkoo was still in a mild state of shock. "Umm.. it's good to talk to you too. What, exactly, are you doing over there?!"

"Oh. Well, it turns out that, like a lot of these guys, my parents were quote-unquote 'Benedicts'! Isn't that cool?!"

Donkoo nervously chuckled. "Yeah, I guess it is..."

Donkoo finished looking aimlessly to the seat next to him and looked back to the road ahead. Pulled over to the side was a limousine, engine top pulled open and engine smoking. A dark-brown virus was busy trying to fix the apparent damage.

Donkoo continued driving as it looked out of the convoy's window. As the convoy drove past, the virus noticed the limousine's array of shades of green in an artistic pattern. In the smack-dab middle of the limo's side was the tradional Virus Empire logo: a jagged, neon-green "V" with a just-as-jagged, green diagonal line placed beneath it.

Donkoo casually drove past before it did a double-take. It remembered to whom that limo belonged.

Donkoo turned the convoy into a street and used that street to turn the convoy back to the other direction.

Naturally, it got in the path of other cars in the process and attracted a banrrage of honks and insults.

Regardless, Donkoo turned the convoy back to the stopped limo.

"Donkoo," Grimpresence asked. "What's with all the noise?"

"Um, I'd love to chat with you right now, Maytak, but I might have found Gassuk over here. I'll get to you guys later."

With that, the helmet was once again off of Donkoo's head. Donkoo ignored the voices coming from the helmet's mic as it parked the convoy in front of the limo. Now the convoy was parked in front of the limousine and Donkoo emerged to talk to the mechanic virus.

The virus momentarily looked over its shoulder to see Donkoo behind it. Donkoo walked up and stood next to the occupied virus.

"Can I help you out with that?" Donkoo asked.

"Ehh... might," the virus replied, still examining the engine. "You know anything 'bout car engines?"

Donkoo scratched the back of its head.
"Erm, afraid not. Anything else I can help with?"

"If you could keep the Emperor company, that would be nice."

Donkoo slapped its scratching hand to its side and grew a surprised face.
"So this IS Emperor Gassuk's limo?!"

"Yeah," the brown virus annoyingly responded. "Who else? Look, just get back there, would ya? I'm frustrated enough as it is. All the phones and communications are down in the limo, the Emperor won't trust anyone now, and I have abso-fucking-lutely no idea as to what I'm doing. So could you just see if the Emperor wants something?"

Donkoo looked started as it slowly started walking to the back of the limo.

Donkoo spoke awkwardly. "Eh, yeah, sure. Sorry about... you know."

The brown virus didn't seem to pay attention to Donkoo as it walked away. Donkoo walked down the side of the limousine facing the large building next to where the limo was parked. Donkoo reached the black-tinted back window and leaned down slightly to knock. Three knocks afterwards, the window disappeared to reveal a passenger. Donkoo's posture severly stiffened and its face lost all emotion when the passenger revealed itself.

"Emperor, sir!" Donkoo officially shouted.

Gassuk coldly examined Donkoo with its eyes from the inside of the limo.
"Aaaand you would be who, exactly?"

Donkoo still had its posture stiffened.
"Private Donkoo at your service, sir!"

Gassuk looked to Donkoo's eyes and expressed a smirk.
"Well, I'll be... of all of the viruses for me to run into! At ease, soldier. Here, open the door and have a seat.

Gassuk chuckled as Donkoo nervously eyed the vehicle, not daring to touch it in the slightest.

"It's perfectly alright," Gassuk assured. "Here, I'll even do it for you."

Gassuk leaned over slightly and pressed a button from inside the limo. The door slid open to reveal Gassuk, still in uniform- an official jacket with a pair of large shoulderpads and a cape- sitting in the velvet-like interior. Donkoo stood as Gassuk slid over in the its seat to make room for Donkoo. Donkoo was still unsure. In time, it slowly and awkwardly worked it's way to sit beside the Emperor. Once Donkoo sat completely in the limo, Gassuk leaned over and pressed the same button it did before, bringing the door to slide shut.

"So how have you been, Private?" Gassuk asked in a friendly tone.

Donkoo's posture straightened again. "Sir! I-"

"No, no. None of that," Gassuk interupted, still in a friendly tone. "At ease Private. And you have permission to speak freely as long as I'm around."

Donkoo breathed a relieved sigh and smiled to Gassuk.
"Thank you, Emperor."

"You're welcome. Now, you never answered my question. How have you been?"

"Ummm... fairly good so far," replied Donkoo, now relaxed and speaking casually. "After the incident in the Void, it's been a bit stressful."

"Ha. Tell me about it..." Gassuk scoffed. "I've been getting calls and making calls from and to a bunch of families.

It also hasn't been good for our military, to say the least."

"Well, I could see why. That was chaos."

"Yes, I saw. I accompanied the force."

"I heard about that," Donkoo said back. "I must say, sir, that was quite honorable."

"Thank you, Donkoo," Gassuk sweetly replied. "Say, how is my driver doing with the engine?"

"Oh, that virus... said it was aggarvating. Told me that it was hard to fix something if you had no experience at all."

Gassuk chuckled a bit.
"Oh, Flambix was always quite the whiner! You didn't know anything about engines, though?"

"Eh, I'm afraid not," Donkoo nervously admitted. "I've only SEEN an actual engine, like, four times, sir."

"Oh, really?" Gassuk suddenly sounded a bit cold. Its voice now bore a bit of hostility. As Gassuk asked the question, it looked to Donkoo sternly and crossed both pairs of arms in a serious fashion.

Donkoo couldn't help but get a cold chill once it saw the look Gassuk gave it. Donkoo was a second away from asking about Gassuk's apparentl change of tone, but was interupted when the driver returned to its seat.

"Engine's fixed, sir," the driver replied.

Gassuk turned its head to the driver and gave a friendly smile as it did before to Donkoo.
"Excellent, Flambix! Let's get to the General's Station."

Donkoo started to exit the limo, finger near the open/close button, when Gassuk grabbed a shoulder to hold it back.

"Oh, no need, Private. Just ride with us."

"You sure, sir?" Donkoo asked curiously. "What about the truck?"

"No worries. I'll get a magnet-cruiser over here to get it later. Just ride with us. Saves on fuel, anyways."

Donkoo glanced near it nervously.
"Yeah.. um, ookay then."

Gassuk huffed a laugh and slapped Donkoo on the back.
"There we go! No need to be so nervous around me, son! It's quite alright."

After a couple of virus vehicles decided to be courteous enough to leave a space in the road, the limousine was finally able to swing around and position itself back into the road. A couple seconds of wait, and the large amounts was back to its fast-paced, normal self.

Gassuk leaned over to the left side of Donkoo's head. It put one of its four hands over its mouth and where an ear would be on Donkoo's head.

"Oh, and let's not discuss the whole 'incident' thing until we get to the station. Never know who's a spy or something now-a-days."

[McJesus]

I need more of this story. |:C

[Hat Salesman]

Aug 24, 2008 21:51:02 GMT -5 Balto-Boy said:

Never know who's a spy or something now-a-days."

Iiiironyyyyy...

[Balto-Boy]

Chapter 12: The Paranormal

Three people fought off the zombie armada inside the building. They heard the commotion outside, unaware of what was causing it, and simply hoped for the best. The circle of fighters was as tight as possible. The children between were pressed up against one another, unable to move an inch. Frantically, the sword was swung, the scythe was spinning, and the flames erupted in a hurried pace.

The fighters continued until something interrupted them. A billow of smoke blew into the room as the brick wall bearing the large window was ripped apart by a single blow. This distracted both zombies and the fighters while the children were unable to see. The smoke cleared and revealed what caused the momentary chaos. The fighters were glad to see the source.

The grey, bulky creature from outside stepped into the shop. He took and arm and swung it full-circle in front of it. Zombies screamed as the monster’s giant stone fist was brought into their skulls. The large monster continued swinging wildly to clear its path to the group of fighters inside. After destroying a zombie by simply squeezing its head, the monster called out to the group in a deep, commanding voice.

“Everyone! This way! Hurry!” he called as he waved a giant hand to gesture to himself.

The children were finally able to get a glimpse at the stone-like beast. One of the children called back to it.
“Uncle Abigor!”

The red-eyed figure called to him at about the same time.
“Damn, it’s good to see you, Abigor!”

“Let’s get the hell out of here!” the fighter with a pony tail called. All of them silently agreed and immediately ran outside. The mother bent over and scooped up her daughter and again held the hand of the brother. The fighter with the pony tail grabbed the other child and threw him over his shoulder.

The outside not being far away, they all ran outside quickly. The other fighters saw the dog-like creature that accompanied the large monster. The fighter with the pony tail snarled at the dog-like fighter’s sight.

“What the hell is that asshole doing with you?!”

The dog-like fighter raised the special glove and knocked back a handful of zombies with a large, green beam.
“We’ll argue later. I’m kinda busy right now!”

“You all! Just give the kids to Zuul!” the monster ordered. “She’ll take them somewhere safe!”

Some of the fighters looked over at the mention of Zuul. Sure enough, hiding in an alley, was a girl wearing purple clothing and a whip rolled up and attached to her waist. Around her, they could barely make out the outlines of three or four people, apparently children.

The large monster continued talking as the dog-like figure blasted at zombies with his glove.
“We’re gonna distract the zombies so Zuul can-”

The monster was interrupted when something as big as he was smashed into his frame and knocked him to the ground. He got up to see another beast slam a curled-up tentacle into his face, knocking him back even farther. As the grey monster fell to the ground another time, the beast that punched him gave off a muffled roar from behind its apple-like head.

The other fighters, who just came from the store building, stepped forward to fight the beast, but the dog-like fighter beat them to it. He jumped in the air and stunned the beast when his brown foot shoved itself into the beast’s face. As it reeled back, the fighter raised his glove and fired an incredibly large beam of light to knock the beast down. The dog-like fighter yelled to the other group.
“Help us later! Get the kids to Zuul, now!”

Finally, zombies were making their way through the building behind them. The newly-arrived group of fighters started to hack at the zombies behind them. As they did so, they escorted their group of children to the alley the other two specified, leaving those other two fighters to fend for themselves against the large beast and the hoard of zombies surrounding them.

------------------------------------------------

The limousine pulled in front of an average-sized, one-story building that stretched out for about 150 yards, the right portion being an entrance to a shaded parking lot. The limo took a small road that curved out of the main highway and directly in front of the building. Once the limo’s engine stopped and it lowered to the ground, the driver exited its seat and walked to meet the back. It opened the back door, which was directly in front of the building’s front doors, and let out the limo’s passengers. First exited the emperor of the Virus Empire, Emperor Gassuk. Directly after that, Private Donkoo scooted in its seat and emerged from the same door as Gassuk did. Donkoo looked up at the front of the building and read the large sign decorating the top.

“Planet Zangod General’s Station”

As Donkoo looked up, the driver behind it shut the back door and went back to the driver’s seat. In a moment, the limousine started up and was cruising away. Gassuk, who has been walking along the long, carpeted path to the doorway; looked back to see what delayed Donkoo.

“No need to shy away, Private,” Gassuk laughed. “Come! You’re allowed in, I promise!”

Donkoo decided to walk quickly to catch up to the emperor. They walked side-by-side as the doors slid open to allow them inside. Donkoo was amazed at how the entire building’s interior was basically made of marble, a material that was considered precious to the Empire. Fat pillars held the gleaming building up. The inside reflected a tan color and showed some specks of black, brown, and silver. The sides were occupied by waiting chairs between the pillars. It seemed that the building wasn’t incredibly busy in the slightest. The only viruses inside were a few that passed through at a hurried pace with paperwork and one virus -pink with green eyes and long, brown hair- sat at a desk that was placed at the end of the entrance hallway.

Donkoo was amazed by the interior alone and walked along to the marble desk, unaware that Gassuk wasn’t beside it. Once Donkoo noticed Gassuk was no longer with it, it turned to see Gassuk behind it. Gassuk was talking into a handheld radio, but Donkoo was unable to hear anything.

Donkoo curiously spoke up.
“Uh... sir?”

Gassuk glanced up to look at Donkoo. It showed a finger at Donkoo as if to say “just a minute”. Gassuk said one last sentence into the radio and put it away. Afterwards, it walked faster than normal to reach Donkoo’s side.

“Sorry about that,” Gassuk politely apologized. “I needed to take care of something.”

Now Gassuk and Donkoo walked to the reception desk together. Gassuk was first to reach the desk and saw the virus behind the desk, who was reading a Virus Fashion magazine and blowing bubble gum in boredom. Gassuk jokingly slammed two of its hands onto the desk’s counter. The distracted virus jumped in its seat and faced Gassuk in a startled stare. Immediately, it got up to salute the emperor and give the loud “sir” that accompanied it.

“What do I pay you for, missy?” Gassuk said through a cocky smile. As Gassuk chuckled at its own joke, it grabbed Donkoo and pulled it along the left half of the hallway in which the desk lied and walked away. As the two walked off, they could hear the virus they left behind.

“Heh, heh... good one, sir! ... heh... heh...”

A bit of walking and a few salutes later, Donkoo and Gassuk arrived at a door -vastly decorated with jewels and unique architecture- which was distinctly labeled in gold “Royal Meetings Only”. Gassuk opened the door and gestured to Donkoo to follow, which it did.

This room was even more grand than the rest of the building. The floor was, again, made of marble but the walls were now made of a wallpaper with some odd velvety texture, decorated with multi-colored stripes. The main part of the room contained a roundtable with five comfortable-looking armchairs. Farther along, behind the table, there was a wooden desk -with another armchair behind it- that had room for only one person.

Behind that was a fireplace with a brick column that reached to the high, plain ceiling. Along the fireplace’s wall was a multitude of exotic trophies that adorned heads of many different animals, all of different and odd shapes and colors.

Donkoo was, again, dumbfounded by the building’s interior. Gassuk left Donkoo in its bewildered state and walked to the desk at the back of the room. Two claps from its hands, and the fireplace burst to life with large, glowing flames. Gassuk sat at the desk and whistled at Donkoo.

“Hey, bub,” it stated sarcastically. “Come on. Sit down, would you?”

Donkoo was still looking at the room as it headed for one of the armchairs in the middle of the room. The amazement was worn off a bit but not completely, which was quite obvious to Gassuk. Gassuk seemed to lose its patience.

“Hey,” it snapped. Gassuk whistled and spoke again. “Sit.”

Donkoo finally reached an armchair and sat down. Gassuk stared Donkoo in the eyes for a moment, but was soon talking again.

“So, let’s get down to business,” Gassuk started, fingers interlaced. “What do you know about the Void?”

“Umm...” Donkoo pondered. “Well, I’ve heard the stories, of course. The attack, to me, seemed to prove it all true.”

“So you were in the search for the Brotherhood’s headquarters?”

“I believe we have talked about this before, sir, but yes I was.”

Gassuk’s eyebrows lowered. “Private, I would appreciate it if you didn’t undermind me like that.”

Donkoo started to apologize, but Gassuk raised up a hand to stop it.
“Don’t apologize. Past is past us. Now, what happened in the Void, last you remember.”

Donkoo started to recall its venture.
“I, uh, I remember riding in a transport to the site with a bunch of other soldiers. Once we got there, however, I heard a bunch of noises outside. Viruses screaming, machinery being crushed, that kind of thing. I never stepped out of the transport. Before I could, we were tumbled over by something a bunch of times. I was knocked out. When I woke up, everything was destroyed and I was all alone.”

Gassuk has been listening to the Private’s rant intently. After Donkoo finished, Gassuk asked a question that had Donkoo incredibly frightened.
“So, if that’s the case, how did you get back?”

“Um, well sir, I found a convoy that, uh, still had a functioning engine and drove it back.”
“But you said the Brotherhood found you.”

Donkoo gulped and started to sweat. “What, sir?”

“Your message. You sent a message to command asking for help. You said that you thought the Brotherhood found where you were hiding.”

“Oh, that,” Donkoo breathed. “Um, that was a simple mistake. I thought they saw me, you see, but I was apparently wrong. Ummmm.... They didn’t see me until I drove off with the convoy. They tried to catch me then, but couldn’t catch up.”

“Ah, I see,” Gassuk replied smugly. “That makes sense, then. Now, did you encounter anyone on your way back?”

“Not on the way, sir.”

“What about at the border station?”

“There I did talk to another virus.”

“Military, I assume.”

“Um, yes sir. Border Patrol to be exact.”

“Aaaand,” Gassuk questioned. “Did you tell this virus anything?”

“Just about the part of the fight I remembered. Naturally, there were questions once I got there, and I just asked a lot about the Void.”

Gassuk leaned back in its chair and rubbed its chin with one of the upper arms.
“I see. What’s this virus’s name? Do you remember?”

“Ummmm, let me think here... Let’s see... it started with an ‘N’... Noon, Nane, No! It was Neen! Corporal Neen!”

Gassuk stared to Donkoo.
“Oh, good.”

Without haste, Gassuk raised an arm and pressed a button on a nearby telephone.
“Secretary, this is Emperor Gassuk. I want a bounty put out on a ‘Border Patrol Corporal Neen’ on the grounds of ‘Conspiracy to Revolt’.”

The voice on the phone voiced back “Of course, Emperor” and Donkoo looked up in a mix of confusion and fear. Gassuk took its finger off the phone and gave Donkoo the cold stare it once did in the limousine.

“Um, sir? May I ask what that was about?”

“Oh,” Gassuk started. “Well, we can’t have anyone knowing exactly about that little ‘squabble’ in the Void. If word were to spread, I can’t really say what would happen.”

“But, sir,” Donkoo wondered nervously. “What’s that say for-”

Before Donkoo could finish, Gassuk was standing at the desk with a handgun pointed at Donkoo’s head.

“Oh...” Donkoo squeaked. “I see...”

“You see, Donkoo, this has nothing to do with you per say. It’s for the good of the Empire. No one is allowed to know exactly about the Void incident. We can’t have a moral boost for the Brotherhood if they find out that we didn’t exterminate all of the creatures native here.”

Donkoo stood up and started to run for the door. Before it could even turn halfway, a green laser shot from Gassuk’s weapon and grazed Donkoo’s shoulder. Donkoo yelped and leaned over to grasp its hurt shoulder.

“I wouldn’t try it,” Gassuk smirked. “Just stay right there,” it mocked as it waved the gun at Donkoo’s place. Donkoo, still grasping its shoulder, turned to face Gassuk before it spoke again.

“What about everyone else who survived?” Donkoo wondered. “Surely I’m not the only one!”

“As far as records are concerned, not even you survived,” Gassuk coldly replied. “100% casualties, remember? On paper, you’re dead right now.”

Donkoo was dumbstruck yet a third time. It sweated and breathed heavily as it looked down the barrel of Gassuk’s gun. A stunned Donkoo looked into the evil eyes of the smiling Gassuk. Donkoo was now out of options and had no idea as to what to do.

Out of nowhere, a cold rushed past Donkoo’s side of the room. Donkoo shivered as the chill reached it. As the chill past it, Donkoo felt a pop in a leg and smoke began to emit through from under its skin.

*****

“What the hell?” Blue wondered. He took a closed hand and smacked the radio a couple of times when all that was heard from their end was static.

“What happened?” Omniscott wondered out loud. “Was Donkoo killed or is it our end?”

AJ stepped up to the radio and opened the back end. The end slipped down the electrical cord as AJ examined the back of the radio. AJ tinkered with some of the cords and wires in the back of the radio while the others sitting around the table waited.

“...can you fix it?” Zugal asked.

AJ grunted in frustration. “I don’t know! It looks like it’s coming from the other end.”

Omniscott growled under his breath then turned to McJunior and Scondie.
“Hey! Can you guys tell me where Donkoo is?”

“No can do!” Scondie yelled back. “Looks like whatever killed the transmitter killed the GPS, too.”

“Fucking damnit...” Omniscott whispered to himself.

“So now we don’t know what’s happening?!” a concerned Grimpresence asked.

“I guess not...” Blue said. He breathed a sigh and looked to the ground, as did many of the others.

A bit of silence came by before Omniscott said something else.
“Now I wish the bomb wasn’t an empty threat.”

*****

“Ah-ha! I knew it!” Gassuk screamed at the smoking leg. “You are a spy! I knew it since the engine incident!”

Donkoo stuttered. “Wh-wh-what?”

“Hmph. The report from the border said that the engine in that convoy was repaired. Manually. As if someone fixed it. How could you, someone who has hardly seen an engine, suddenly know how to completely repair a demolished truck engine?! Answer that one smart guy!”

Donkoo struggled for an answer as quick as possible. “I-I-I-I um, erm, eh...”

“No need for more lies, mister! I’ll take care of it right now!” Gassuk raised the gun up slightly so the barrel pointed to Donkoo’s forehead. Gassuk grew angry as its finger was placed on the trigger. Donkoo stood still, frozen in fear. Its eyes shut in anticipation.

Gassuk pulled the trigger, but it missed Donkoo completely. Donkoo opened its eyes finally, wondering why it wasn’t dead. Immediately it saw Gassuk, all arms lowered, staring forward at nothing, paralyzed. As it stared in wonder, Donkoo heard Gassuk mumble to seemingly itself.

“You... how?! How are you here?! This is impossible! You’re dead!”

Donkoo stared back, but Gassuk didn’t seem to notice. As Donkoo looked ahead, it jumped when it heard a voice in the back of its mind.

Donkoo... run... hurry!

Donkoo took the voice’s advice almost immediately. Donkoo spun around, knocking over its chair, and sprinted over the table and out the door. Gassuk still stood in fear as Donkoo left.

Donkoo sprinted down the hall as fast as its four legs would scurry. Again, it reached the reception desk to see a started receptionist. Met for the first time, however, were a trio of armed guards. Three armored viruses were between Donkoo’s path to the main door. They raised started rifles to aim at Donkoo when they, too, suddenly became over come with fear, just as Gassuk did. The viruses turned and ran out of the building as fast as they could as they screamed. Donkoo heard one of the viruses call something out as it left.
“The Benedicts are back! They’re back!!!”

Donkoo jogged up to the door once the viruses fled. One of the viruses, to Donkoo’s luck, decided to drop a rifle and some ammunition clips as it ran away. Donkoo bent over and picked up the rifle with two of its four hands. As it examined the weapon, Donkoo thought to itself.

Something tells me I’m gonna need this.

Rifle in hand, Donkoo ran outside and looked for a vehicle. As it stepped outside, Donkoo looked up to the sky. A fourth time, Donkoo was shocked beyond words. The sky was littered with warships of all kinds. Donkoo didn’t need to count to be able to tell there were hundreds of thousands, probably millions, possibly billions, of ships heading to the same area: the Void.

Donkoo looked faster.

*****

Gassuk stared at the image before it. The shape was a very familiar one, for sure.

“You... how are you here?!” Gassuk demanded.

I am the first of many, Sonny Jim. And we’re going to take this place back.

“You don’t get it! The game has been played! You lost! You all perished at the hands of the Empire!”

And yet you’re the one who’s shaking in their boots...

“You couldn’t stop us before, Balto-Boy, and you aren’t going to end it now!”

The outline Gassuk saw smiled. Then it dissipated into the air. Gassuk still wore a bit of shock on its face. Then it noticed Donkoo disappeared. Then its face was angry. Gassuk, in a rage, took papers and the phone on its desk and threw them around the room as it screamed loudly. Teeth gritted, Gassuk pulled out the radio it had before and turned it on.

“Generals! We have no more time! Are the ships ready???”

The radio spoke back. “Yes sir. At your command.”

“Yes. We’re going now! No more waiting. Send all ships to the Brotherhood’s headquarters!”

[RobotKilla]

O M G! I must read more!

[The Omnipresence]

Chapter 12: People come back to life all of a sudden.

[Hat Salesman]

UNCLE Abigor? Holy shit!

[ProDuce]

Erm... Yeah, i'm confused about the whole coming back from the dead thing...?

[McJesus]

Ha! Beauty!

[Balto-Boy]

Aug 27, 2008 23:23:31 GMT -5 ProDuce said:

Erm... Yeah, i'm confused about the whole coming back from the dead thing...?

Oh, you'll find out soon enough...

[Balto-Boy]

NOTE: In case you folks didn't figure it out yet, the italicized section of the chapter is a continuation of Grimpresence's dream from Chapter 10. Great. Now that that's done with, let's get this show on the road.

Chapter 13: Preparation

The three fighters carried the three children to the alley. The large monster and the wolf-like battled zombies in the middle of the road. The mother used her arm to lead the brother into the alley and lovingly lowered the daughter and her hurt leg. The pony-tailed figure also put the child he was carrying into the alley.

Once the children were in place, the red-eyed fighter talked to the older woman in the alley.
“You’ll get them out of here, right?”

The woman, fairly tall with a brown pony tail and purple hat, responded coldly.
“I’ll die before I let those things get a hold on these kids.”

“Good,” the red-eyed fighter said hurriedly. He looked down to two of the children left there- the girl with a green skirt and damaged leg, and the red-eyed boy with brown hair- and spoke to them.
“Take care of each other, you two. And listen to Aunt Zuul.”

With that, the red-eyed fighter darted off to the battle, hands glowing under large purple flames. The pony-tailed figure looked to the other boy they left- the one with long hair and wore green and red clothing.
“Be careful out there, Yarameh. You know these guys can’t take care of themselves!”

And again, another fighter was off to assist in the fight. The pony-tailed fighter said his words and instantly unsheathed his katana afterward. Now it was the mother’s turn. Only for her, no words were spoken. The mother knelt down in front of all of them and brought them close to her. She brought her arms around the three frames and embraced all of them at a single time, head facing the ground. Keeping her hands on the children, she leaned back to look them all in the eye. After an odd amount of time, the other woman interrupted the moment.

“Don’t worry Grimscott. I promise I’ll take care of them.”

The mother took her time to stand back up. As she did, she grabbed her scythe, which she laid on the ground before, and stood it straight along with her. Still, she could not bear to take her eyes off of the three children.

Someone yelled from the zombie crowd.
“Grimscott! Hurry up!”

The mother’s trance was then broken and she, too, was off into the fight. The tall woman took the daughter and held her to her chest. The other two followed her as she ran deeper into the alley. Hiding inside were four more children, three girls and a boy. One girl had incredibly long hair and fists of stone, one had grey skin and hair and wore an expressionless face, and the other girl was incredibly small with yellow hair and what appeared to be a mouse’s tail and small flaps that greatly resembled mouse ears. The boy was fairly small. He had a large puff of brown hair and had small wings sprouting from his back.

“Alright, follow me, kids!” the tall woman passionately ordered. As a group, the children and their caretaker were pacing down the alleyway. Shortly into the jog, there erupted a familiar scream from the zombie crowd. At the sound of the scream, the daughter and her brother looked back.

“Daddy?!” the daughter asked to nothing.
“Dad?!” the brother also asked.

After these rhetorical questions, the tall woman and the rest of the children also turned to look. They all noticed an evil pair of reddened eyes looking down the alley. And they bounded down and into the alley. As the figure and his eyes reached the alleyway, someone shouted “Omni! No!”, but were unable to keep this figure from actually entering the alley where the woman and children hid.

The tall woman swore under her breath and put the daughter down to the ground. She stepped in front of the children and uncurled a long whip from the side of her belt with her right hand. The figure and his evil eyes continued forward.

The daughter screamed from the sidelines. “Daddy! Daddy! You’re okay!”

In a bit of ironic timing, the tall woman cracked the whip and snapped it directly in the figure’s face as the daughter called to him. The red-eyed figure flinched and threw his head back, but then lowered it dramatically to evilly look at the group and reveal the gigantic gash in his face deep enough to show muscle tissue and bone. The whip was even enough damage to unhinge one side of the figure’s jaw.

Soon after the figure showed his face, the brother ran up to the woman and shook her leg vigorously.
“Aunt Zuul! What’re you doing?! That’s Dad!”

Ignoring the pleading child, the woman cracked the whip again into the figure’s face. This time the figure instantly fell face to the ground, motionless. The woman looked coldly to the felled figure while the daughter and brother’s eyes started to water almost instantly. More screams were heard from the end of the alley, which attracted the woman’s attention. She cursed again when she saw the zombies trying to work their way into the alley. The fighters on the other side were knocking away many, but she could tell some would still get through.

“Kids! Run!” she called back. The majority of the children and the woman ran down the alley, but the daughter and brother decided to cry next to the downed figure. Soon, the woman looked back and saw the children.

“C’mon you two! We have to go!”

The woman scooped up the daughter in her arms and dragged the reluctant brother by his hand. Both the daughter and brother looked back on the now-dead figure lying on the ground as they fled, bawling their eyes out.

----------------------------------------------------------

Donkoo ran to the side of the road with rifle in hand. Cars were whizzing by, hovering over the ground, as they sped along the road. Donkoo lowered its rifle so it wouldn’t appear hostile and jumped and waved to try to get the attention of passing drivers. Unfortunately, no one was willing to pay the slightest bit of attention to Donkoo.

Overtime, Donkoo’s enthusiasm was brought lower and lower as more cars whizzed by. Eventually, it was standing aimlessly and darted its eyes and head desperately for another option. One quick, momentary glance at the sky revealed that the warships Donkoo spotted before were still making much headway to the Void. Still, Donkoo tried to find a vehicle with frustration.

Far up ahead, it finally noticed that the cars were slowing at a 3-way intersection. Donkoo leaned forward and squinted its green eyes to try and figure what was happening up ahead. Unable to find an answer from where it stood, Donkoo scampered to the disturbance on its four bug-like legs up to the intersection.

- - -

At the intersection, cars were lined in ship-loads at a roadblock shutting of the side of the intersection where Donkoo stood. The side opposite had cars cleared off of the road and on the sidewalks. Between the sided line of cars, military convoys and carriers blazed in between the two columns of cars forced to the side of the road. Donkoo also noticed that many of the incredibly large gatling guns were being wheeled between some of the convoys. It looked to the cars on the road to see viruses closing in on the roadblocks soldiers have placed as to get as close to the transports as possible. Naturally, soldiers forced them back to an extent.

Donkoo was examining the drivers and their actions when it heard a voice saying something about itself. It looked past the roadblocks and saw virus soldiers heading toward it. The two soldiers maliciously marched at Donkoo. One virus pointed its rifle into the air and fired two shots. The gunfire caused virus civilians to scream and scatter in a mobbed mess.

“Hey you!” one of the marching soldiers shouted at Donkoo. “Stay right there!”

Donkoo noticed the two finally and looked with a horrified face for some sort of escape. That’s when Donkoo noticed one of a civilian in the car next to it. Donkoo climbed on top of the car’s top and leaped to the other side. The soldiers took notice at Donkoo’s actions and started shooting at the car. Dents were made in the car’s exterior, but Donkoo managed to land at the driver’s side of the car without a mark of any kind.

Donkoo was crouched down next to the car and covered its head as the soldiers still had their rifles aimed at Donkoo’s general direction. Donkoo tried to open the car’s door, still crouched down, but to no avail. It looked into the car’s window and saw the terrified would-be driver looking back at it. Donkoo tried to stay as low as possible as it took the butt of its gun and smashed it into the car’s window. The virus inside leaned over and covered its head with all four arms while it hunched up into a ball. The scared virus looked back through the window and saw a bent-over Donkoo pointing its rifle into the car.

One could tell that Donkoo had really no idea as to what it was doing just by the shakiness and loudness of its voice.
“Get out of the car!” Donkoo yelled at the virus. At first, the virus in the car only looked back with a face frozen in shock.

“I SAID GET OUT!!!” Donkoo shouted again. “Hurry up and open the door!”

One of the virus’s shaky hands inched to the “open” button. The second that door on the car shot open, Donkoo took one hand off of the rifle it held and yanked the virus out of the car. Without any concern for the other virus, who now laid on the ground, Donkoo quickly slid into the car’s driver’s seat and pressed the “start” button on the dashboard. Now the soldiers fired much more rapidly at Donkoo as it got the car ready. Donkoo lowered its head as fast as possible so it laid under the dashboard and thus avoiding the rifle shots, which blazed through and shattered the windshield.

The car levitated and the engine purred to life. Donkoo jerkily pulled the car out to the sidewalk, hitting the car behind it in the process. It ignored the swears it got from such an action. Donkoo managed to pull the car out to the side of the road and speed it on the sidewalk. The car easily cut through the virus soldiers and regained access to the road. The car hovered between two convoys trying to pass through the road and completely swapped sides. Completely on accident, Donkoo also let the car hover along the side of a line of cars. The speed from the sudden swerving combined with the hover angle let the car fly into the air and land atop of the same line of cars. Civilians watched in amazement as the car flew by along the tops of cars. Soldiers in the convoys, however, readied their weapons.

One thing Donkoo noticed as it drove was up in the sky. At the sight, Donkoo was amazed at how fast these ships were. They were more than two-thirds to the Void already.

*****

Silence echoed in the Brotherhood headquarters. The only noises were when Nick decided to emerge from his room and see what kept all of these people so quiet. Then the only noise was the sound of “Bad Touch” coming up from the cups over his ears.

“What’s with the silence?” Nick asked in his normal, annoyed tone.

McJunior swivelled in his computer chair to face Nick.
“Umm... we lost contact with the spy we sent into the city.”

“Hehe. Way to go, fellas,” Nick scoffed.

Omniscott raised his head and dully stared at Nick.
“Shut it, Nick.”

Again, the silence was evident in the room. Blue was now the one to break the silence.
“So. Anyone got any ideas?”
No one answered at first, but Grimpresence softly suggested something.
“We could go out and find Donkoo.”

“That’s not the problem, sis,” Omniscott said in a boring tone. “We might’ve just given all of our info to Gassuk. That virus we sent knows about where this base is and who we are. We might have just screwed ourselves over.”

“Then what is there to do, really?” Zugal offered. “We can’t really do anything then, could we?”

Omniscott started to answer but couldn’t get a word out when the entire headquarters was filled with an insanely loud siren. Blue and Grimpresence leaned over and covered their ears, but everyone else stood tensely and looked to the computer where McJunior and Scondie operated.

“What the hell is that?!” Blue screamed over the siren.

McJunior pressed a button on the computer to shut off the siren.
“We got virus warships heading this way, that’s what.”

Omniscott paced over to the computer and leaned to see the screen at McJunior’s side. Scondie sat in a separate chair and watched the two converse. The rest of the group walked next to the computer as well, but tried to stay behind Omniscott and McJunior.

“Get to the RADAR reading,” Omniscott told McJunior.

“Already on it,” McJunior said as he typed a command on the computer’s keyboard. Two key-taps later, a crude map of the Void and the edges of Mylok were seen on the screen represented by shades of green. Something odd showed itself on the screen, however. McJunior gasped when he saw all of the dots blinking on the computer monitor.

“Hooooly fucking shit...” Omniscott said under his breath.

Dots were appearing over the Void’s edge and progressed rapidly toward the Brotherhood Headquarters entrance. Grimpresence looked to the screen and wondered at it.

“What? What’s going on?”

Omniscott turned to his sister. He pointed to the screen as he looked back to her.
“See those dots there?” Grimpresence nodded.
“Those are Virus military warships.”

Blue stepped forward at the mention of the warships.
“Warships? What do they look like?”

Scondie answered this one.
“They’re big and round, basically. They move insanely quick and can fire these huge lasers out of the front. And-”

“Never mind,” Blue said back. “I know what you mean now. So how many are there?”

McJunior silently entered another two-key command on the computer. A window popped up and white numbers started to scroll. Once they stopped, McJunior read off the number.

“3, 190, 284 warships.”

No words. No one even so much as breathed. The only audible noise was the faint sound of music coming from Nick’s headphones, which one could barely hear at all. Everyone was hypnotized by the image of the white, blinking dots heading to where they currently stood.

“So... there’s more than 3 million ships heading this way to kill us?” Yarameh asked in redundancy.

“Looks that way,” McJunior said without looking away from the screen. “And let’s not forget the virus and mechanical soldiers those things might be carrying. And I guarantee that they’re going to bring ground troops and those big guns over here.”

“So let’s get out of here!” Grimpresence nervously almost shouted.

Omniscott stared intently at the screen.
“Ehhh... the rate those things are coming, we’re gonna get blasted if we try to get out there now. There’s no way we could outrun them.”

“Besides,” Nick said with pessimism. “Where would we go? It’s called ‘The Void’ for a reason.”

“I hate to agree with Nick, but that’s right,” Omniscott said while finally turning away from the computer screen. “Any other area that we could get to would be too far away for us.”

Yarameh sounded excited.
“So now we’re gonna get our hands dirty, right?”

“I’d say so,” Omniscott replied.

“Then let’s get the Brawlers’ weapons and suit up!” Blue said enthusiastically.

[The Omnipresence]

Chapter 13: Flight and Fight.

[McJesus]

Chapter 13: The future is not to bright, Donkoo is outta sight, enemy ships are in flight, good guys ready to fight, I could grab a bite (to eat).

[Balto-Boy]

I'll warn you guys, this is a long 'un. I counted about 8-9 pages. But if you have the patience, go ahead and read up.

Chapter 14: Infiltration

The tall woman continued running behind the crowd of children that accompanied her. The daughter and her brother were still crying, but were forced along with the woman and children. The woman saw behind them a mob of hungry zombies running after their next meal.

One of the children looked back to see the zombies chasing them. The woman caught the image of the smallest, blonde-haired child jumping behind the fleeing group. She turned around to look to the child and see her angrily looking to the zombies.

“Penny Get back here, now!” The woman yelled, still grasping on to the daughter and her brother.

The child, however, ignored the woman’s demand. Penny threw up her tiny hands and squinched her face. Before the woman’s eyes, the mouse-like child seemed to stretch out horizontally and then suddenly created two exact copies of herself.

The woman swore yet again and let the two children she held down to the ground. She commanded the rest of the children to stay where they were as she ran to the three clones of Penny.

“Look, Zuul!” the original rodent child called back. “I used Daddy’s power!”

The woman desperately reached for the child.
“Penny! No! We gotta go!”

The woman reached and tried to scoop up all three of these children, but a creature fell on top of them right before she could get a hold. The woman leaped back in surprise and saw the zombies digging at the three viciously.

“Get off of her!” the woman screamed as she unrolled her whip. The unrolling motion smoothly rolled into the whip’s typical snap. The woman rapidly cracked the whip again and again at the zombies on top of the three Pennies. Seeing the whip’s lack of effect at first, the woman brought up her other hand. Out of her palm, bolts of electricity shot forward. Now the woman cracked her whip and shot electricity simultaneously.

The children were watching from behind the woman, seeing her fighting hard to destroy the zombies. They all were entranced by the flinging of the woman’s arms. Finally, one of them wasn’t satisfied with just watching. The brother grew stern and ran forward. He threw his hands in front of him and flicked his wrists in desperation. He was finally able to activate his power and started shooting tiny blobs of purple flames at the zombies.

Two more followed suit. The boy with the large hair ran and flung his arms to produce explosions about the size of sparkler flames. The girl with the stone fists also stepped up to fire sparks from her rocky fingertips. The only three left -the daughter, the other boy, and the monotone girl- watched with anticipation as the four people threw everything at the determined zombies.

The woman gradually stepped forward to push the crowd back down the alley. The children followed her example, but their powers were too underdeveloped to kill any of them. Nevertheless, all four of them together forced the zombies to back away from the position of the mouse-like child. But once they did, the woman looked in horror down at the ground. She saw the child they tried to rescue... at least what was left.

She looked in anger from the partly-eaten child to the crowd of zombies trying to force their way back. Reluctantly, she pushed the other children with her away.

“We have to run, kids! Let’s go!”

With that, the children ran along side of their current guardian. They ran down the dark alley, the tall woman looking back only to fire an attack or two at the zombies behind them, and to a light at the end. At the end of the brick-lined alley, a light shimmered from the darkness created by the alley’s seclusion and revealed a road. A road in the open. And there were no zombies in sight up ahead.

But as she ran, the tall woman became startled. The ground shook and thumped from the other side of the alley’s right wall. This noise was moving, because one moment it sounded from behind, but quickly moved up to their position. As the noise sounded by, the wall jumped up and down with each thud. The shockwave from the source of this noise was strong enough to shake bricks loose and to the ground. The tall woman looked to the noise as it rushed past them, but jumped back as it slowed in front of them, but not for that reason.

All of the group’s remaining members stopped as a landslide of bricks were smashed from their frame and dropped to the ground, billowing up dust and clogging the alley’s pathway. The tall woman looked ahead to the resulting pillar of dust. Zombies even slowed to examine this new factor in the chase. Soon they all found this source of strange noises.

A huge, muscular being trudged through the wall, easily knocking away more bricks to make room for its incredibly large frame. The being first stared to the wall in front of it, but soon turned itself calmly to eye the tall woman and her cargo. It leaned forward with hostility and opened its mouth wide to let out an oddly loud and intimidating roar.

“Duh... Daddy?” the girl with stone fists and a large flop of brown hair said softly.

Behind her, the tall woman sank to her knees. Her eyes were wide and her mouth hung open. In a tone no one could hear but herself, she whispered to herself in denial. She eventually screamed.

“NO!!!”

The muscular being took a step and then leaned over slightly to smash a large stone fist into one of the alley walls. The wall shook and crumbled from the topmost level to bring bricks to the ground. It seemed that this lug was able to smash the wall in the right spot to separate the tall woman from the children. The woman raised an arm to cover her face from debris that might fly into the air. Once she looked back, she could no longer see the children that were once right in front of her. But the zombies could still see her.

On the other side, the large hulk sternly looked to the children in front of it. The children stood in front of the newly-created pile of rubble, but all that stood in front of them were this beast and the other brick pile that blocked their only exit.

The stone-fisted girl spoke softly again. “Da-daddy? What’s wrong, daddy?”

But it wouldn’t answer. Not with words, anyways. The zombified demon only roared.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Alright, viruses! We’re approaching the entrance point to the Brotherhood’s hideout! I won’t lie, you might face hell once we touch the ground, but you all must remember why you’re here: to protect the empire you live in and love so dearly! Now be ready! We’ve got almost 6 minutes!”

Kkang, like many of the viruses around it, sat in silence as the commanding officer of this warship gave the militia this little spiel. The virus soldiers and SWAT members were sitting in a dark room lit by neon-green lights that dotted all around. The commanding officer sat at the front of the room and manned a radio linked to command.

Kkang, being bored, lifted its rifle up into the air to mess around with the various snaps and switches. It pulled back-and-forth on a small peg that loaded in a new clip. Kkang didn’t pull it back or forth far enough for it to do anything, so the action really had no purpose. After this, Kkang slumped back in the large bench encircling most of the room and sighed.

Sargent Kkang seemed to be much calmer than the rest of the viruses accompanying it. Kkang looked bored and obviously wanted to be elsewhere. Some of the virus troops couldn’t close their eyes in the slightest, they were so frightened. Most of the viruses were sitting quietly with stern faces, however. They would occasionally look to each other, but were quickly back to staring at the floor or the circular wall or wherever they decided. But there were those few viruses breathing heavily, looking with gigantic eyes, and maybe nudging a neighboring virus in an attempt to start a comforting conversation. Kkang only looked from virus to virus, looking for something that interested it. This virus has been wearing a “when are we gonna be done?” look for basically the entire trip. No one questioned why Kkang wasn’t showing fear of the Void or the Brotherhood.

All was quiet after the C.O. tried to give a pep-talk and spur the viruses’ confidence with themselves. The time engulfed by the silence bored Kkang even more. The minutes they had left seemed like hours. But, in due time, the hours passed, and Kkang was alert and ready to go. It lowered the visor on its helmet, as all the others did, and raised the rifle to its chest with a pair of arms. The ship in which they flew was hovering in midair at this point, ready to open the hatches at the bottom and release the viruses into the warzone.

“Gentlemen,” the commanding virus told them as it, too, readied a weapon, “Good luck, and godspeed.”

A moment after, trapdoors opened at the floor and the viruses jumped through. Kkang hit the ground and pushed the gun’s butt into its upper right shoulder. All it saw was white. Everything was white; except for the enormous fault in the earth that was open really wide and extended past one’s normal seeing distance.

Near that fault was what looked like a smooth, tiny, manmade split in the ground. What it really looked like was the crack between a pair of old-fashioned elevator doors. Other viruses apparently saw this before Kkang, because they were working to get it open.

*****

Donkoo was amazed that it was leaping over an entire line of cars one-by-one. Of course, after a warning from the first guard Donkoo encountered spread, the rest of this convoy line was also after Donkoo. Through open slits in the walls of the convoy’s holding section, the typical “wha-choo” of a multitude of standard virus military rifles firing at the single, rebellious car.

Donkoo ducked its head to avoid shots blasting through the side window. The virus lifted its head at the very minimum required to see where the car was heading. Donkoo looked past the wheel in time to see the line of cars carrying it end.

The car leapt into the air and crashed down to the earth. Donkoo violently bobbed up-and-down as the car smashed into the ground, creating a fireworks display of sparks, and then wobbled back to the normal hovering motion. Donkoo managed to regain its vision and concentrate on the road. Again, Donkoo looked just in time. There was another line of cars ahead, resting on the side of the road as the previous line did. This time, because Donkoo’s car was now on the side of the road, this cars were about to smash into the front of Donkoo.

Donkoo turned the wheel to the right as hard as possible, in a spur of the moment, to swerve the car out of certain doom. The car quickly drifted off into the road and, in a severe amount of luck, the car only grazed the convoys it drifted and squeezed itself through. The car continued drifting and headed to the other side, which now didn’t hold a line of cars as it did once before. Rifle shots were only stopped momentarily, but were soon sounding off again. As Donkoo laid its head back as low as it could while still being able to see the road, it looked over in the passenger’s seat. Donkoo’s rifle was laying there, untouched. Donkoo reached over with the right arm it wasn’t using to steer the car and grabbed the rifle. Donkoo was hiding behind the car’s door, but it was now firing back.

*****

The Brotherhood of the Wolf HQ looked generally the same as usual. That is, of course, except for the 4-foot bunker freshly built in the smack-dab middle of the floor. Crouched on knees or sitting on their behinds were the members of the Brotherhood, equipped with all of the Brawlers’ weapons. Blue; equipped with Balto-Boy’s aura glove, ProDuce’s wristbands, and Ghost’s laser goggles; sat still and intently listened with an ear to the ceiling as an odd noise was buzzing from outside.

“You guys hear that, right?” Blue whispered.

McJunior was perched next to Blue on one side, holding RageBlood’s M16 in one hand and a golden Desert Eagle (the source of Bulet’s powers) in the other.

“Yeah,” McJunior replied. “I guess they’re here.”

“I’d say they’re trying to drill through the elevator hatch,” added AJ, who wore Markus’ gauntlet and a sheathed katana.
“Ah, we’ll be ready for ‘em!” said Yarameh; equipped with Grimscott’s and Aiden’s scythes, his own katana, and Bazooka Bro’s rocket launcher.

That was the last comment uttered before the Brotherhood members knelt in silence, listening to the noises above them. Everyone was laying still, the only movements being them looking to one another and the occasional peek over the bunker. For what seemed like hours, the only real noise was the drilling sound of viruses digging into the tough upper doors. From behind this makeshift bunker, many of the members were looking to the elevator doors on their level. All of them looked up to the sky once the drilling noise ceased.

The digging seemed to end abruptly. And there wasn’t a single noise coming from above ground. Blue and his teammates listened intently for hints as to what was happening. At first, it was only silence, making it seem as if the digging has stopped. But they knew that wasn’t the case, because the viruses have yet to jump down and actually invade the hideout.

Still, there was nothing but quiet. Soon, though, there was a different sound: screaming. Faintly, yet distinctly, there were the sounds of screaming viruses coming from the surface. From underground, one could tell there were words shouted, but they were too soft to really understand. Shortly thereafter, there were the alien noises of the virus rifle shots. First, it was very small scale, coming from one particular area. But sure enough, the sounds of gun shots spread across the field and more and more viruses were apparently fighting some great threat. In the midst of the chaos, the viruses decided to restart the digging process.

The Brotherhood was letting down their guard. Some stood in place a bit in order to get a better sound of this array of gunfire and screams along with the digging drills. Then another noise was added. All of the headquarters seemed to shiver and quake as a distinct rumble sounded throughout. It came from below, but the noise was passing by and shook the headquarters harder and harder as it grew louder and louder. Many of the Brotherhood members were clutching the sides of their heads to block out the intense noise.

“What on Earth is that?!?!” Grimpresence shouted over the noise.

Blue smiled, despite the deafening sound around them all.
“We got allies now! It’s our backup!”

*****

The only thing in Kkang’s view was one of its squad-mates wriggling on the ground, clutching at a hoard of white creatures clasped to its body. Kkang grasped its own rifle with one pair of arms and swiped off as many of the animals as it could with the other pair. The teammate, its eyes being covered by the small and round animals, was unable to pick one of them alone and was wildly swiping in hopes of knocking them away. Kkang peeled the last one off of the other virus’s face and held it in the air. The tiny, armless creature shivered as Kkang was quick to shoot it with the rifle. Kkang tossed the corpse to the side and looked down to his teammate, now covered head-to-toe in bloody bite marks.

“Oh dear lord.... thanks, Kkang!” the virus shouted over the hysteria around them.

Kkang didn’t look to the other virus as it shouted back. “We aren’t done yet!”

At this point, Kkang was busy shooting at any non-virus thing that was heading its way. Except for the giant tentacle sprouting out of the ground. Kkang knew that thing was way to big for it to take down on its own. Besides, ships and troops were firing enough rounds at it anyways, but they were obviously angered with the thing’s tactic of diving underground then popping back up elsewhere.

Kkang was busily blasting at more of the little creatures that attacked its comrade earlier. It shot as many as it could and swung the rifle around it to bash the creatures that managed to slip by the rifle shots. Kkang was firing under the stress of these creatures; along with other viruses, forcing the animals to focus on another area; when something caught Kkang’s eye out of its peripheral vision. Barely visible in the middle of the green rays being fired in all directions, there was a square-shaped creature (which seemed to resemble a large computer chip) hopping along the battlefield.

In a break from the attacks from the other race of creatures, Kkang looked over and followed the square animal with its eyes. One virus soldier was unaware of this new creature because it was firing at the small white animals already. This new creature, therefore, was able to jump up and onto the virus’s back without any immediate notice. The virus looked back to see the creature burrow itself under the virus’s skin. Kkang thought the process was incredibly painful. In all of Kkang’s life, it never heard anything scream as loud as that virus screamed then.

The virus the square, green creature attacked dropped its rifle and was stumbling around the ground, incredibly lucky that it wasn’t shot. It fell to its knees and threw off its combat helmet to clutch its head with the upper pair of arms. It screamed far above the level of noise of this madness. Kkang saw the virus look up to reveal a glowing set of dark-red eyes. As it looked up, there was green virus blood splattered to the ground as odd spikes shot from the virus’s forearms. There were also leathery wings that stretched out from the virus’s back. The virus looked among the warzone with a cold and emotionless stare. It bent over to scoop up the weapon it dropped before and aimed it. This time at other viruses.

Viruses busily defended themselves from the white animals and the gigantic tentacle terrorizing the military force. This evil-looking virus raised its rifle and fired three shots into a virus directly in front of it. The startled virus yelped as one shot pierced its shoulder. It lurched forward as another shot blasted it in the back of its torso. And the final shot was able to fell and kill the virus when it sliced through the virus’s neck.

A different virus saw the action and pointed out this possessed virus to the viruses around it.
“Guys! That virus has gone rogue!”

This virus got the attention of three other viruses around it. All of the four viruses pointed their rifles at the mutated virus and fired as many rounds as possible. However, the virus with the protruding wings and the arm spikes stood in a single spot. The shots from the retaliating viruses were easily sinking into the rogue virus’s flesh, but they had no effect. The rogue virus walked calmly to the four viruses firing ferociously at it, the shots only creating green splurts of blood and nothing more. The rogue virus walked forward still, despite how many clips were emptied into it.

Kkang felt a need for action. It ignored its surroundings and sprinted on all four legs at the rogue virus, still walking to the viruses firing upon it. As Kkang ran, it lifted up its rifle and pointed at the rogue virus to fire. Kkang was dashing to this mutated figure as it let off yet a fifth array of shots at this odd virus. The rogue virus stopped walking. It turned slowly, still being fired upon, to look to Kkang. But the rogue virus looked to see Kkang raising the rifle by the grip over its head.

Kkang flung the rifle with all of its might at the rogue virus’s head. Lucky for Kkang, the rifle smashed the other virus directly between its eyes. It stumbled back and rubbed its forehead while Kkang still rushed onward. Kkang leaped up as it ran. It flew in the air and brought back its dominant hands in closed fists. The rogue virus received two swift punches to the side of the head and was knocked to the pure white ground. Kkang lurched to lay atop of the rogue virus, but it received a brutal and bloody hit when the rogue virus smashed two sets of the spiky arms into Kkang’s face and torso. This forced Kkang to the ground, where the rogue virus was able to place two of its feet to pin down the now-injured virus. As the rogue virus kept Kkang from moving, it spoke.

“You stand no chance, Virus scum,” it cruelly stated in an deep, scratchy, and oddly-toned voice. The virus was close to smashing another set of spikes into Kkang again, but was violently interrupted by an outstanding barrage of laser shots overwhelming the rogue virus.

The rogue virus grew angry and looked into the source of the source of these shots. It seemed to ignore the fact that the shots were going through and tearing flesh off of the virus’s body. Not too far away, was a giant robot warrior firing a ridiculous amount of gatling guns at once: there was one large one sprouting from its chest, one on each shoulder, and five at the end of each of its arms.

Kkang saw the odd robot firing in its direction as the rogue virus angrily charged at the robot. Kkang also noticed that a crowd of slender and tall robot soldiers were heading to the rogue virus’s location. Obviously, warships have finally decided to deploy the mechanical Virus soldiers.

Out of curiosity, Kkang’s bloody face turned to where two virus soldiers were digging through the elevator shaft. The drills were no longer being used by the original virus workers. Two new viruses were drilling through, a pile of corpses encircling them. Kkang watched and saw the drills suddenly jerk farther into the ground. They dug for a split-second more, and then there was nothing left to dig through. At that point, one of the virus diggers lifted a hand to the side of its helmet and yelled something Kkang was unable to hear. But soon after the virus stopped digging, it jumped down in the hole along with the other virus that dug with it. Along with that, Kkang heard a frantic message in its helmet’s earpiece.

“Soldiers! The door is open! Everyone get in there! Go, go, go!”

*****

Donkoo still under the door and fired at the convoys next to it. Donkoo couldn’t see the results of his rifle, what with being concentrated on the road and all, the convoy riding beside its car was being littered with dents and holes in the armor. A few shots even managed to cross into the eye-slits viruses inside the convoy fired through.

For whatever reason, though, the gunfire stopped. Donkoo stilled kept its head down, being skeptical about whether this was truly the end of the barrage. But Donkoo grew alert when it looked farther down the road. About three or four intersections away, there was another roadblock. Unlike the previous one, this roadblock was basically a sturdy wall in the road. The previous roadblock was one made up of a few planks and some patrolling guards. This was all of that in overkill. Guards surrounded the entire stone wall that has been pushed to the middle of the road at the intersection ahead. As Donkoo was examining this, it already passed one of the four intersections that was its last hope of escape. Donkoo It definitely knew what was happening when it noticed the convoy next to it gaining speed to get ahead of its car.

Donkoo pressed one of its feet onto the gas button at the floor of the car, trying to keep up. The convoy was drastically gaining distance and leave the car.

Donkoo passed the second intersection.

Donkoo’s car seemed to accelerate faster than the convoy, because its car was racing next to the convoy, closing up the distance. The front of the car was brought up level to the convoy’s front and began to pass the convoy entirely.

Donkoo passed the third intersection.

Now Donkoo’s car was half-way past the convoy. Slowly, but surely, the car was getting ahead of the convoy. Donkoo had the gas button pressed as far against the floor as it would go. The speedometer was passing the 100-mile mark. Donkoo was stressed enough to sweat intensely and breathed hard. The car reached more than 120 miles an hour when the convoy was starting to gain distance again. Donkoo was more than three-fourths from passing this intersection and smashing into the roadblock. Now was the time. It was do or die.

Donkoo let go of the car’s gas button and let it coast for a moment. Then, as violently as possible, the steering wheel was forced to Donkoo’s left, taking the car with it. As Donkoo turned into the street, the side scraped into the front-right corner of the convoy next to it. The car’s back end swung to the right as the actual car turned and knocked a lamp post off of the sidewalk and into a building’s window. Donkoo struggled with the wheel, the car wobbled violently as Donkoo was wriggling the steering wheel in all levels. Lucky for it, the car eventually steadied. Guards yelled and swore as the car sped off down into the street. There screams were silenced when the convoy that sped along with the car slammed front-first into the stone wall and busted into a giant green fireball.

Donkoo looked behind it using the car’s rearview mirror. It chuckled in delight as it saw the explosion’s fire lower and the resulting smoke rising into the air. It looked forward to see the entire concrete strip abandoned. The virus’s tense shoulders slouched and Donkoo back fell into the driver’s seat as it let out a relieved sigh with a smile.

I sure hope it’s smooth sailing from here, Donkoo thought.

But in a twist in intensely bad luck, it wasn’t. Squad cars braked and lined up along another intersection now on the course of the road Donkoo traveled. Donkoo swore and brought itself back to the tense driving position: teeth gritted, wheel gripped tight, and posture leaning close to the windshield. Donkoo saw virus police officers taking cover behind the cars, readying their weapons.

Donkoo turned into another road to its right, not as violently as it once did but still quite forcefully. The virus leaned to the right in its seat as it pulled the wheel in the same direction. The car turned the corner, and Donkoo immediately regretted turning that way. In its view, there were a pair of viruses on each side of this newly-encountered road, who just laid down a long strap across the road. And as soon as Donkoo entered the road, it went over the viruses’ spear-strip.

A virus on one side of the road pushed a button on a controller as the majority of Donkoo’s car passed over the strip. Once the button was pressed, a row of sharp, metal rods sprang from the strip at lightning speed. They clipped enough of Donkoo’s car to do catastrophic damage.

Donkoo was cowering and screaming inside the car as its tail end flew in the air and brought the car to do a front flip. Donkoo was no longer screaming as the car dived to the ground and its front smashed into the road; spewing electrical wires, glass, and metal shards everywhere.

The car kept momentum and flipped over a second time. The crushed and pierced car slid across the road while it rocked like a see-saw and simultaneously spun like a top on its roof. Sparks were accompanying a screech as the concrete grinded away at the common car’s paint and metal frame.

After a good distance of about 70 yards, the car eased to a stop into the middle of a small, unpopulated road near an alleyway off near the sidewalk. Not a lot could be seen inside the car, but one thing that could be seen was blood. And lots of it.

[Deleted]

Damn Balto, that's my new favorite chapter.

[McJesus]

I'm always in time to see another of Balto's brilliant chapters. :)

[Hat Salesman]

Donkoo got pwned.

[The Omnipresence]

Chapter 14: A whole lot of shit happens.

[atlasttrulyaghost]

Aug 3, 2008 2:47:41 GMT -5 Grimscott said:

Aug 2, 2008 21:44:13 GMT -5 Balto-Boy said:

She looked up to see the rugged, tired face of the man carrying her. Scars littered his face and one of his large, red eyes was no longer able to stay open.

-red-

Good gravy, I must have a secret fetish for fellows with wounded eyes.

.....

[Grimscott]

Sept 30, 2008 20:49:55 GMT -5 @atlasttrulyaghost said:

Aug 3, 2008 2:47:41 GMT -5 Grimscott said:

-red-

Good gravy, I must have a secret fetish for fellows with wounded eyes.

.....

And what is that supposed to mean?

[McJesus]

Sept 30, 2008 20:54:16 GMT -5 Grimscott said:

Sept 30, 2008 20:49:55 GMT -5 @atlasttrulyaghost said:

.....

And what is that supposed to mean?

Ghost has goggles cause his eyes are wounded. Wink wink.

[Balto-Boy]

Another long one. Regardless, here you folks are.

Chapter 15: The Outside World

The giant being raised an arm up. It swung it forward and snatched the stone-fisted girl from the ground. The children yelped in shock as the girl was raised into the air, who was crying intensely with snot running. The beast showed its teeth in a snarl as it examined the girl in its gritty fist.

"Daddy..." the girl stammered inbetween sobs. "What are you doing???"

And the beast licked its lips. The beast showed its teeth even more and opened its jaw. From the wall of shattered bricks, some of the children were bold enough to launch their measly, weak attacks at the monster holding the girl, but to no effect. As the children tried to (but couldn't) stop it, the large beast was bringing the girl to its open jaw.

But then, from over the fallen wall of bricks, the woman protecting these children leaped into the air. She brought forth a hand and launched lightning bolts at the large, grey monster. The monster dropped the girl to the ground and clutched its face. The woman unrolled her whip and cracked it at the beast while it covered its face still.

"Mom!" the horrified stone-fisted girl called. "What's the matter with Daddy??!!"

The woman cracked her whip again and fired another lightning bolt.
"He's very sick, Zugal!"

"Is he sick like Mr. Apple?" the girl with the injured leg asked.

"Yes, Grim! Just like Mr. Apple!"

The beast suddenly roared and brought a fist down over the woman. She rolled to the wall and fired another lightning bolt. The beast flung the other arm at the woman. Again, she rolled away. Backing to the other wall, she cracked her whip once, twice, three times. The beast flinched with each snap, but was still able to bring his hands together and fling them at the woman. The woman ducked to avoid the hit, jumped on top of the beast's arms, and then to his head.

She sat on the beast's shoulders. She brought a hand to both sides of his heads. And the beast glowed and roared in pain as the woman sent 20,000 volts into his ears.

"Mom! Stop hurting Daddy!" the girl screamed.

The woman ignored her daughter's plight and continue to surge the electricity into the large beast. The monster was so damaged by the woman's attack, it started to stumble, its large frame easily knocking more holes in the alley's brick walls.

But the beast was still conscious. It worked a stumble into a charge. The impact the beast made with the already-battered brick wall was enough to spin the woman off of the beast's shoulders. And as she looked up, the monster had its hand tightly gripping the woman's entire face.

"MOM!!!" the already-traumatized girl called out. She ran forward at the large monster's leg. The other children called out and told her not to, but the girl was running to grasp onto the monster as hard as she could.

"Daddy..." she sobbed. "Stop hurting Mom!"

The woman kicked and flailed in the grasp of the behemoth, who was easily ignoring his daughter's request. The woman cracked her whip whenever possible. She brought a hand to the monster's wrist and tried to electrocute it. What the woman didn't realize, however, was that the electricity wouldn't travel through the monster's stone hand. And now the woman was raised high enough that she would be at eye-level with the monster.

The beast furiously stared at the woman, even though her face was hidden behind his hand. Still the girl cried at the monster's leg and the rest of the children watched in horror. The beast took the woman and threw his arm in the air while still clutching on to her. The arm jerked down quickly. The woman's spine snapped the same way someone would snap a rug. The electric surge stopped. The whip was released and fell to the ground. And the beast let the woman hit the floor. And the beast looked hungrily at the dead body of the children's only bodyguard.

----------------------------------

“Here they come,” Blue whispered to himself. “Everyone aim! Especially you, McJunior!”

Blue then reached up and pulled the red goggles he wore over his eyes. He aimed both the goggles and the glove, which was glowing with a faint blue and emitted a soft “baa-ing” noise, at the elevator door. Scondie was at one end, readying his laser vision; McJunior put down the Desert Eagle and pointed an empty hand and the M16, Grimpresence was pointing the rifle she acquired from Blue’s escape from long before, AJ aimed an M4 carbine, Yarameh readied the bazooka he carried, Zugal’s hands were glowing with blue static, and Omniscott held an open palm and his TMP. Nick had nothing to aim, though. It was hard to recognize Nick under all of the green, thorny, alien armor that he wore.

Two viruses almost simultaneously touched the ground and pointed their rifles in front of them. However, they weren’t even able to fire a shot. As soon as he saw them, McJunior spawned an explosion and filled the entire shaft with fire. The Brotherhood stayed alert as the fire spread in the shaft, slowly dissipating and filling the shaft with smoke. The room itself was silent. The only noise anyone heard was the battle above them. There weren’t even sounds of breathing.

The smoke was still clogging up the room when more viruses appeared from behind the smoke. McJunior was knocked back by a rifle shot before he could set off another explosion.

“I don’t frickin’ believe it!” McJunior yelled after a pain-induced growl. “That’s the second time, now! Gah-damnit!”

AJ crawled to her brother from behind the cover of their bunker. She dug around McJunior's wound to examine it as the amount of laser shots grew more and more. Explosions could be heard from the bazooka Yarameh used. The sound of herds of sheep were echoing as Blue used Balto-Boy's glove to create a succesion of small sheep bombs. Along with those, the sounds of bullets and energy blasts were blending into the close-set chaos.

Blue ducked under the cover when a virus appeared with a large laser weapon laying on its shoulder. The bomb launched from the weapon smashed into the cover the Brotherhood fought from. Because Blue ducked in time, he avoided the impact entirely. But Yarameh was not quick enough and was knocked back. He flew far in the air, dropping the bazooka in the process, and smashed his back into the wall behind him. Yarameh clutched his stomach and tried to breathe after all of the air was knocked out of his system.

"Shit!" Blue swore.

He jumped away from the cover and into Yarameh's direction while spinning to face the virus firing squad. Blue reached over and pressed a button on one of the wristbands he wore as he came to face the viruses. A blue disc quickly expanded in front of him. Virus rifle shots pounded into the blue shield, but bounced away and back into the source of the fray. Blue could've sworn he heard a virus scream as one of the shots ricocheted directly back at it.

Blue backpeddled behind the shield's cover and bent over to Yarameh, though didn't look at him. Blue strained as the viruses seemed to take notice to the downed Brawlers and focused their fire. Blue used his other arm to push the arm branding his shield back at the viruses, shots deflecting off in every direction.

"Nick!" Blue yelled back. "Nick! Distract them!"

Back at the battlefront, with the sounds of war and the armor's ability to muffle voice, Nick's response could barely be heard by Blue.
"I gotcha! Don't worry!"

Nick pushed on of his spiny gloves under a plate of armor. His fingers could be seen twiddling with something underneath. When Nick did finally pull his hand back out into the open, there was the sound of Slipknot being added to the gunshots and explosions. Nick leaped over the cover and ran boldly into the crowd of viruses at the elevator door, a loud clank with every step he made in the intimidating armor. Blue, watching as he protected a recovering Yarameh, could see Nick's limbs flying at ridiculous speeds, even with the somewhat bulky armor. Blue relaxed slightly as the shots lessened on him and Yarameh. He reached back and brought Yarameh up to his knees.

Blue looked back.
"Stay up with us, alright?!"

Blue and Yarameh ran back up to the battle, Yarameh picking up the bazooka he dropped on his way. Yarameh aimed the bazooka carefully, making sure not to hit the agile Nick, and shot a rocket into the elevator door. Nick ignored the shot and continued punching, throwing, and overall pummeling all of the viruses that were unlucky enough to cross his path. His teammates were determined to shoot all those that Nick missed.

However, everyone was thrown off guard when a gigantic thud sounded from above ground. Blue looked up with concern to the unseen sky. Yarameh was curious at Blue's stare.

"What is it, Blue?!" Yarameh yelled over the gunshots.

Blue didn't answer the question specifically. He said something only to himself.
"I really hope that's not what I think it was..."

*****

It awoke hanging upside down. Its vision was blurred and slowly regained its normal state. It looked around, trying to find out where it was and why it was there. Vision was still blurry, but it seemed that it was in the middle of a road, turned over in a car. As it examined the road, it received a splitting headache. It tried to bring a hand up to lay atop its head, but there was no response to the brain's command. Then it looked to its right and knew why: there was an arm missing. One of its two right arms was severed and a green, bloody stub replaced it. Then it used the other right arm (which was incredibly sore) to clutch its forehead, which felt wet and gooey to the touch. It brought the hand in front of its eyes to see its only right hand drenched in green blood.

The virus's vision was, for the most part, regained. Its hearing grew back as well. The new sounds helped bring back the reason for the predicament it was in. The virus heard sirens in the distance; faint, but definately there. Everything came back at once: the Empire, the Brotherhood, the convoy, Emperor Gassuk, and the car chase on the highway. And now Donkoo knew those sirens were looking for it.

Donkoo took a left and right hand and reached to the seatbelt buckle that kept it sitting in the car. It moaned as Donkoo fiddled with the buckle, trying to find the "release" button, with its sore hands. Donkoo felt the small button and pushed in with its fingers. It fell to the top of the car and yelped when shards of glass cut into its shoulders. Donkoo had to let its four pulverized legs hit the steering wheel and then the car's top before it could slowly slide out and into the road.

By the time Donkoo had completely emerged, its whole body was laced with tiny glass and metal pieces. Before getting up, though, Donkoo remembered the rifle it had in the car. Lucky for its battered body, the virus was able to just reach in the backseat to grab the thrown-about rifle. Donkoo used the rifle's shoulder strap to lay the rifle across its back. It then worked through the pain throughout its limbs to get to a stand. But when Donkoo stood, it almost fell off balance. That's when it realized that two of its legs were paralyzed.

Now there wasn't any time to worry about that. Donkoo could hear the sirens coming closer. Donkoo awkwardly skipped along on its two legs that still worked. As it hobbled, the virus looked for a place to hide. It spotted the alley by the road fairly quickly and hopped there to hide.

The alley was dark and deserted, the ground was dirty and filled with litter. Donkoo looked down this stone hallway and noticed pathways in the alleyway that led to more alleys. Donkoo turned at the first one to its right. Its back pressed against the wall now, Donkoo relaxed its two tired legs and slid to sit on the ground. Even its butt hurt now, apparently. A cringe and moan later, Donkoo unstrapped the rifle and placed it in its lap.

Donkoo examined this alley with tired eyes as it sat. Contrary to what Donkoo thought, the people of the city haven't completely dismissed the use of old-fashioned garbage dumpsters. Another look back to the original alley startled Donkoo to where it jumped out of its seat. Just ahead of the path where it sat, Donkoo saw bones. And they looked like the bones of either a small child or a large rat. Donkoo couldn't tell.

Now the sirens were right outside the alley. Donkoo could hear viruses getting out of their vehicles and one yelling out orders to the rest.
"Alright! Let's find out where this guy went! No one leaves until the virus dies!"

Donkoo dared to slip its head barely around the corner to see the viruses. Police officers were surrounding the overturned car Donkoo was driving. They bent over to examine the road, the blood, and the car. Some were talking with the police commanding officer, some were collecting bloodied glass shards and car fragments, one was holding up a severed arm, and some viruses were simply looking around the mess for clues. Donkoo looked to its rifle. It pulled out the clip and looked into it. Then the clip was slapped back inside. Donkoo had a few shots left.

*****

The fight in the Void has been quieted greatly. The rogue virus, recently destroying the soldiers attacking it, looked on with horror at the target of a barrage of warship blasts. The white, round creatures that attacked the virus army were beginning to flee in one mob (though there were those who stubbornly still fought). Kkang noticed the roge virus's blank stare and looked in the same direction it was.

Kkang saw virus soldiers dancing as cheers were being broadcasted on its helmet's intercom. Kkang noticed the viruses were dancing on top of a giant purple limb, which was dead on the ground and covered in black burn spots.

"It's not over yet!" Kkang's helmet shouted. "Get in that hole and kill the Brotherhood! The other drill team is working elsewhere! Go!"

"Raep! No!!!" the rogue virus shouted. "I'LL KILL YOU ALL!!!"

Rushes of air were shot back at Kkang as the rogue virus glided across the ground with its newly-acquired wings. Kkang covered its eyes to block out the debris of dust and dirt coming from the virus. When Kkang's eyes looked back, it saw the rogue virus jumping and leaping all around the dead tentacle, slashing at virus soldiers who hopelessly fired with their lousy pea-shooters.

Kkang looked back to the entrance to Brotherhood HQ. Viruses were leaping inside faster and faster. It was a miracle that they all could find room underground. Kkang decided they had enough help. It checked its weapon for ammo and ran to fight the rogue virus.

*****

Nick's hand ran through a virus's head. When it returned to Nick, it brought spots of blood and brain chunks with it. Nick ducked under a laser shot and launched himself at another virus. A blade-shaped hand was spun into the virus's head, leaving a sizable, fleshy dent in its skull. Each new virus falling into the room brought Nick into another graceful trasition from the killing of one virus to another. Though one hit wasn't enough when mechanical soldiers started to enter the fray.

Still behind cover, the new alliance of Brawlers were fighting with their ranged weapons (and trying to avoid Nick in the process). Grimpresence, however, being new to fighting, was hiding behind the cover and blindly fired her weapon above the cover. And explosion, however, grazed Nick and blinded him. Nick covered his armor's visor, but a virus shot snuck in under his armor in the process. Nick fell to the ground with a yell and grabbed his arm. AJ looked to see Nick on the ground. She was only more tense when she saw virus and mechanical soldiers readying their weapons for him.

AJ brought one of her arms behind her and flung it forward. When her arm was parallel with her shoulder, there was a puff of smoke busting from her forearm. Her forearm was seperated from the rest of her arm except for a stretched-out bone. Her dismembered arm flew around like a tetherball and her fist smashed into the bodies of advancing viruses. While fallen viruses were trying to grasp at what had just happened, Nick took this distraction to his advantage and crawled back to the cover.

Now the virus's firepower has intensified. Green lit up the hallways. The odd noise of individual shots ran together in an unrecognizable heap of noise. Somehow, a gigantic robotic soldier bearing 13 gatling guns managed to work its way into the hideout. Brawlers were covering their heads under the level of their cover. Those with projectile weapons were peeking them barely over their protection, fearing they would get hit if they exposed any more of themselves.

Blue strained his voice to yell over the intense sound.

"WE CAN'T TAKE ANYMORE OF THIS!!!" he yelled at AJ, the brawler closest to him. "IS THERE A BACK DOOR?!?!"

"WHAT?" AJ shouted.

"BACK DOOR. YES OR NO?!"

"YEAH!!! IN TRAINING ROOM!!! GOES ABOVE GROUND!!!"

Blue flashed a thumbs up. "GREAT!" Then he looked past AJ to the injured McJunior, who was sitting low and clutching his shoulder.

Blue cupped his hands over his mouth.
"MCJUNIOR!!! CAN YOU RUN?!?!?"

McJunior couldn't yell as loudly as Blue, but he got the word out.
"YEAH! NO PROBLEM!"

Blue didn't answer back. He held one of the bracelets he wore in front of him. The fingers of the other hands fiddled with buttons on the bracelet. Blue pressed a certain button, and more than 10 other Blues spread out from the original Blue's spot. The Brotherhood was taken by surprise and some even jumped. The cloned Blues pushed the other Brawlers away from their cover. Then each of the new Blues activated two large, glowing discs that blocked the virus shots. The stood menacingly, shields in front of them, and looked to the viruses with contempt as they stood still and blocked the shots.

The original Blue lurched to the back of the headquarters. He motioned to the other Brawlers to follow.
"C'MON!! LET'S GO!!!" Blue shouted. "WE'RE GETTING THE FUCK OUTTA HERE!!!"

Without a twinge of reluctance, the Brawlers followed Blue into the training room. Grimpresence was up and running when something caught her eye. She stopped and turned to look into the gunfire. The shine from the fake-Blues' shields were blocking her vision, but she could recognize someone important.

AJ ran back to Grimpresence and clutched her shoulders. As she pulled Grimpresence to the training room, AJ yelled out a question.
"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING, GRIMPRESENCE?!?!"

Grimpresence didn't take her eyes away from what she saw.
"THAT'S KKANG! KKANG'S IN THERE!!!"

----------------

*****

----------------

Kkang was pulling the trigger on its rifle as fast as possible. It watched and shot at the mutated virus decimating Kkang's teammates. The battlefront has grown much quieter than before. The small, round animals have disappeared for the most part. Virus soldiers only picked off stragglers as the troops headed for the entrance to the Brotherhood HQ. The real war was taking place around the tentacle corpse, where virus troops were trying vigorously to destroy this rampaging monster of a virus. And that's where Kkang was heading.

As Kkang grew closer, it noticed a warship round blazing into the rogue virus, hitting with a loud boom and billowing smoke everywhere. Kkang stopped dead in its tracks. It watched the raised smoke in anticipation, waiting for any movement. Finally, the smoke cleared. The rogue virus was lying on the ground, motionless. Kkang looked worried as it waited to see this result, but it became cheerful once the virus was seen on the ground. And so did the other troops. Virus soldiers surviving the rogue's onslaught were cheering from atop the dead tentacle.

But Kkang's worry returned. The rogue virus stood. How it was alive still, Kkang could never guess. The virus only stood on three legs. The blast has apparently removed its farthest-left leg, a large chunk of its torso, and the entire left side of its head.

Now this was the freaky part. Even as far away as it was, Kkang was horrified at this sight. The rogue virus's flesh grew out. Skin and muscle were forming from where there still was living tissue. The tendons twisted and turned to form body parts. Skin was covering these new segments as quickly as they formed. Kkang even swore that it saw a bit of bone growing. And in seconds, the rogue virus's body and mutations were grown back good as new. Other viruses that watched this were standing blocks of ice. Some viruses abandoned their weapons and ran as fast as they could. Kkang was one of the blocks of ice. It took a moment for it to regain itself.

Kkang noticed that the virus was looking up. It looked to where the rogue virus looked to see the warship that blasted the rogue.

Kkang pressed a button on the side of the intercom in its helmet.
"Ground to air! The renegade virus is attacking! Get out of there!"

The air ship buzzed back to Kkang.
"Air to ground, what is a single viru-"

Ka-bloom! The ship exploded into pieces. Out of the aerial fireball, the rogue virus emerged floated to the ground. Kkang panicked. It shouted a warcry and began firing at the rogue virus. Kkang yelled as the shots flew into the air and at the rogue virus, who still floated to the ground. The virus didn't seem to care about the shots piercing it.

It fell without the slightest hint of being in any sort of pain. But the rogue virus did switch direction toward Kkang. KKang took steps backwards, but still fired. The rogue virus decided to plummet at Kkang. Before Kkang could react, it was back on the ground. The rifle has been knocked out of its hands, and virus stood with a swung arm, staring at the downed Kkang.

"I'm starting to get sick of you," the rogue virus said coldly in its odd voice. "I'm tired of all of you things. Especially you, you persistant little gnat."

Kkang didn't question any of the virus's short speech. Still panicking, Kkang rose to its feet as fast as possible. It pulled a handgun from its ammo belt and started to fire. But the rogue virus was still coming at Kkang, even with the more powerful handgun rounds hitting it. It took its sweet time, too. The rogue was pacing angrily at Kkang, staring it down with an evil glare as it did so.

Then, in a flash, Kkang was being raised in the air. Apparently, the rogue virus was tired of being patient, because it has sprinted with lightning speed at Kkang and was now raising it by its neck. Kkang clutched its throat with two opposite hands. Kkang was also still shooting the handgun at the rogue virus. But the rogue virus was simply looking up to Kkang with an emotionless stare, ignoring the handgun rounds still.

"If the Brawlers couldn't kill me, what makes you think you can?"

The rogue virus was bringing back a spiked arm when something blasted both it and Kkang into the air. Kkang hit the ground hard. It coughed and weezed for air after its sore throat has been released from the rogue virus's grasp.

Kkang looked around and noticed the rouge virus was shaking its head as it slowly stood. In another direction, it saw group of virus and mechanical soldiers. All of the viruses wielded the explosive, tube-shaped plasma launchers and all of the mechanical soldiers were of the HeavyDuty class (the large kind with all of the gatling guns equipped).

"Don't worry, soldier!" a virus shouted to Kkang. "We got your back!"

The rogue virus was just now standing completely when another plasma blast pummeled it. Once the virus hit the ground, it could be seen that the shot completely mangled its legs. And already, the virus was starting to repair them.

"Let's go fellas!" the same virus called. With that, the virus and its comrades charged at the disabled virus. The virus soldiers were spreading out into a line. The rogue virus was almost finished regrowing its legs when another shot flung it into the sky. It hit the ground, and another plasma shot hit it. It tried to fly away, and there was another shot. The HeavyDuty mechanical soldiers were trudging their heavy bodies up to the rogue virus.

Now the battered and bruised virus was struggling to regrow itself. At every moment it tried, the virus soldiers fired upon it. The odd voice, sounding frustrated, shouted at the fighters.
"This cannot be happening!"

The living torso bounced around, flying up and hitting the ground under the shots. Numerous times, it rose and fell, regrowing slower each time it hit the ground. It bounced more and more until it was left alone. It did not regrow itself this time, even though it was reduced to a third of a torso, one arm, and the head. Kkang watched as the giant mechanical soldiers finally reached a crippled rogue virus. And their guns started spinning, warming up to fire.

Kkang smirked with satisfaction as the mechanical soldiers were readying themselves. It arose to its feet and picked up its rifle. The virus sprinted to the hole leading to the Brotherhood's headquarters. As Kkang ran, it heard two things: the sound of the mechanical soldiers firing everything they could, and thunder.

*****

Even at the end of the escape hallway, the members of the Brotherhood could still hear the gunfire in the headquarters' main room. At the end of this long, underground, unpaved hallway; there was a long ladder leading up to a small hole of light. The ragtag team of Brawlers was beginning to climb up to this light. Most of the fighters were scaling the long climb (Omniscott leading the pack) while AJ, Zugal, and Grimpresence waited for space to grab on as McJunior was calmly flying upward.

"Wait a sec... you hear that?" Blue said. With that, those on the ladder stopped climbing and stood on their rungs, listening for whatever Blue was talking about.

"Hear what?" Omniscott asked.

A roll of thunder.

"There it is again!" Blue said to them.

"what? The thunder?" Yarameh questioned from under Blue.

"Yeah, that."

"So what?" Omniscott asked.

Blue looked up to him.
"Tell me. In all the time that you've lived in the Void, when have you ever seen any weather of any sort here? I know I never saw any."

[McJesus]

As much as I love every chapter, I'm saddened by the fact that I can't read any more when I finish it. :(

[Balto-Boy]

Alrighty, then. Final chapter. End of saga. Done and done. I wanted to finish the story up and get it out of the way. Finish what I started, yadda, yadda, bleh.

Anyways, I tried to make this one shorter and not strain anyone. So yeah. Have a good last read, here.

Final Chapter: Spirits of the Fallen

Zugal didn't let go of the giant monster's leg when she screamed back to her mother. The monster looked down to Zugal and shoved her away with a strong swing of his leg. She flew back and slammed into the kids cowering near the rubble pile. As they stood to regain themselves, the monster stepped closer.

The large, grey beast was a few feet away from the children. His ferocious teeth decided to show themselves. But now the beast was obviously angry. He stared to the children with a look that screamed "I loathe you and your guts". The beast's red eyes gleamed under its creased brows. His arms locked in place and his fingers flexed, waiting to grab onto a sack of flesh. The beast was ready to leap over and destroy every one of them.

His anger changed to wonder. The beast looked down and saw something attached to his leg. This something was pretty much a white ball with stubs for feet. It was lurched on to the monster's leg, nibbling away at the muscle. At first, the beast didn't really seem to respond, but a loud crunch brought him to wince.

The beast growled in anger and lifted the small creatrue up, encircling his entire hand around it. As it looked to the little guy, there was another irritating itch. Then another, and then another. The monster looked down and saw that more of the little animals have lurched to his legs, engulfing them completely. The monster roared when it dropped the one animal it was holding and started to swat at the others.

The children watched intently as more of these little animals were attacking the large monster. Except for Zugal. She hid her head in the back of the group. Obviously, she didn't want to see any of this.

More of them leaped from the ceilings attached to the alley walls. One of the creatures wore a white cap bearing a red "M", a fact the young Yarameh eagerly pointed out. The creatures came in waves soon enough. They piled on top of the howling beast like water rushing into a glass. From under the animals, the beast was swinging his arms, snarling, biting, and roaring with little effect. The animals kept coming. Soon the crunching noises grew more numerous and the beast's noises softened. It happened more and more as the beast was sinking to the ground. The crunching sounds kept bouncing off of the alley walls until the beast's movements slowed to a crawl. And eventually stopped entirely.

The children cheered excitedly and were raising their fists in the air and whistling. Zugal was starting to show a reddened face, but reluctantly clapped. The small animals were wandering to the children in curiousity. Some of which eventually tried to bow on thier pudgy little feet.

"I love the Pixels!" exclaimed Omniscott.

But, as fate would have it, there wasn't a lot to cheer about soon. The zombies behind the rubble pile eventually figured out how to use their hands and fingers. They were starting to climb up and over to the children.

----------------------------------------

Omniscott punched the cover off of the escape route's hidden exit. The giant metal disc shot into the air in the Void and spun on the ground like a spun quarter. He quickly brought up the upper portion of his body and looked around, his machine pistol ready. His entire body twisted and turned so Omniscott could get a good look as fast as possible. Satisfied, he climbed out completely, then looked back in the hole to call to the others.

"Alright! Everything's clear! Hurry..." Something caught Omniscott's attention. "...Whoa."

Blue's head emerged from the exit. He looked across to the other side of the cavern. Now he was glad the viruses haven't noticed them yet, because he saw the firepower the Empire was using against them.

The amount of aerial ships dotting the skies were astounding. They were everywhere. The sizes of the crafts ranged from gigantic clouds to specks of pepper. It looked as if there were more ships in the air than there were fish in water. Miles and miles, the line of convoys and military vehiucles spread. They lined the cavern's edge for a good mile at least. Virus soldiers were walking around the site, most of them channeling themselves into the elevator shaft that brought the Brotherhood into their headquarters. It looked like there were enough soldiers to fill four or five football stadiums, not including the mechanical virus soldiers.

Blue remembered the Robos all at once, and all too well.

"Yeah, no kidding..." Blue responded as he jumped out into the open. "...look at all of those viruses."

"That's not what I meant," Omniscott corrected, pointing to the sky.

Blue looked up to see what Omniscott was talking about. Up above all of the Virus military forces was a single cloud. A large one. A very large one. The span looked like it stretched long enough back to reach Mylok. It at least escaped Blue's vision as it headed in that direction. And it was just big enough to span across all of the viruses' vehicles and crafts. Every single thing was covered by the cloud's shade. There was literally nothing outside of its reach.

But there was something else about the cloud. Blue realized it once the thunder sounded again. When it sounded once more, Blue saw the cloud spark. It glowed with light. But there was no sun in the Void... where would that light come from. Further more, why was there a cloud in the Void to begin with? The Void is supposed to be filled with white, white, and more white; nothing else. Blue figured out all of this and couldn't help but stare with his mouth open.

Soon, Yarameh revealed himself and saw this too. Then Nick. Then McJunior floated up to them. Then Scondie. Then Zugal. All of them saw this giant fluff floating in the air and marveled at the sight of it. All of them stood around that single opening and looked up to the sky, not a word spoken amongst them.

Of course, there was something to break the silence. Rifle shots echoed from the hallway below the emerged Brawlers. AJ was frantically climbing out of the hole when the Brawlers helped her up. Grimpresence was panacked and sweating when she arrived to the surface.

"Bad news," AJ told to Omniscott. "They're right behind us."

"Well, crap..." Omniscott muttered.

The entire group was startled when a handful of laser shots sprung up from the hole in the ground. Afterwards they heard one scream "Get back here, you sons of bitches!".

Grimpresence decided to be tough and aimed her Virus rifle into the hole. She unloaded the rest of the clip she had into said hole. She was satisfied when she heard viruses yelp and pain and hit each other as they fell off of the ladder.

"How d'ya like that, bitches?!?!"

Omniscott pulled Grimpresence back from the opening.
"Sis, I love your energy, but we can't be too obvious right now."

Grimpresence looked back into the hole, but kept the rifle lowered to her waist. She wanted to see what the result of her attack was. She saw viruses stacked on top of one another, but she also saw a giant robot over-equiped with gatling guns. Grimpresence fell back and yelped as a pair of shots grazed her green cap.

The rest of the Brawlers looked back to the hole to see what was the cause of this. AJ and Omniscott knelt near Grimpresence to see if she was okay. The rest of them only looked back. As they all looked to Grimpresence, Scondie gave a short yell of surprise when something singed his hair.

"Duck!" McJunior shouted as he dived to the ground. Brawlers laid over and kept low as a swarm of laser shots came from the other side of the Cavern. Not as much noise as underground, thankfully, but there was still the apparent wooshing sound of shots roaming through the air.

"Can this day get any frickin worse?!" Nick shouted through his armor.

Now there was another noise. A soft rumbling, like a tiny earthquake. Blue had the urge to turn his body over. He looked to the other side of the Cavern to see a red glow that came from... the ground. A fissure was splitting open and revealed a blood-red light near the viruses, who were either looking inside curiously or backing away.

The fissure eventually stopped growing. Once it stopped, Blue saw the cloud swirl open from the middle. There was now a giant gap, containing only the Void's white sky, in the cloud close to the edge of the Cavern. Then, from the hole, it was like a stage light. A gigantic ray of yellowish-white shone across the landscape. Viruses covered their eyes to shield their vision. Blue was glad this distraction brought the gunfire to a stop, but was in too much awe to stand.

The air in the light was starting to wave a bit, much like the air would on a humid day. But the air didn't wave as a whole; only in sections. Blue squinted at the waving that dropped from the cloud's mouth. He realized it formed a shape. A familiar shape. This shaped hovered under the light for a moment before moving sections of the form, a movement Blue could hardly make out. Then its movement stopped. There was a grand silence where nothing seemed to move. And in a moment: chaos.

Like rushing water, more of the wavy shapes rocketed from the cloud's mouth and rained down upon the viruses. They pounded in the ground directly around them. Blue also noticed there were a few shapes, one incredibly large, emerging from the fissure. And as the forms pummeled the viruses, there was madness everywhere: explosions rattled the ground, fireballs shot into the sky, green energies blew over virus soldiers, shapes flew under vehicles and shoved them in the air, blue discs popped in-and-out in places...

All of a sudden, there were purple and green sparks directly in front in front of Blue in the sky. The Brawlers looked up to see the sparks form shapes. Out of thin air, gigantic concrete roadblocks (as tall as the walls of a three-story house and long as a dozen school buses) formed from the sparks and slammed into the ground. It blocked off all of the shots that might head in their direction. As well as the view of the neighboring chaos.

Blue couldn't see anything, but all of the noise sounded familiar. He thought he had heard every single noise- every boom, every zing, every other noise- once before, but couldn't figure what they were exactly.

Soon, he heard voices. They were the sounds of jests, taunts, and cheers. Again, they sounded familiar. They were so far away, though, he couldn't make a single noise out. All of the sounds sort of meshed together in one giant blob of shouting.

Blue jumped a bit when he heard a voice next to him.
"Hurry! Let's go! We don't have much time here!"

Blue looked to his left and saw one of the wavy figures right next to him. He looked to the others and saw them staring at it as well. Then Blue went back to staring at the shape, unable to figure what its source was.

"C'mon, Blue," said the emotionless voice coming from this shape. "Don't you remember me?"

Blue's eyes squinted, his mouth hung open slightly, and his face wrinkled with concentration. Blue stared intently, and a figure began to reveal itself. It was a person. Blue was still trying to figure out who the person. And when he did, his eyes grew wide and his jaw dropped almost to the ground. Blue whispered to the shape in amazement.

"Ne...Nekrozoa...?!"

*****

"Hey, guys!" Check out this trail of blood over here!"

Donkoo's heart nearly stopped. It had no idea how he forgot he was bleeding all over the place. In the dark alley, Donkoo peered a tiny bit around the corner. Sure enough, there was a trail of dots of green blood. And one of the virus police officers was telling the others to follow it as it got a handgun ready.

Pain still in the three arms it still had, Donkoo raised its rifle slightly. The weapon was tilted so the barrel was closer to its head and the weapon's butt near Donkoo's waist. Donkoo, again, peered around the corner. The viruses we getting closer. Donkoo pulled its head back and looked to the corner's edge, ready to fire as soon as the virus walked into Donkoo's line of vision. Without looking down the alley, Donkoo could tell they were coming right up to it. The footsteps were getting a bit loud for Donkoo's liking. Now Donkoo started to sweat, its knees knocked against each other (at least of the two legs still functioning), the virus started to hypervenalate a tad. Donkoo quivered as it placed a finger at the rifle's trigger.

A sudden explosion caused Donkoo to jump out of its skin. The footsteps heading for Donkoo stopped. A voice screamed out "What the hell was that?!". Another explosion. Viruses were screaming and swearing loudly. One virus called out to the thers.
"There! That's the guy! Kill him!"

The sound of rifle and handgun shots filled up the air. Now Donkoo heard the same footsteps heading for it running back to the noise. Then there was something Donkoo had never heard before. It sounded like magic. There was a brief ringing noise then a loud "puff". It sounded another time after that. Then again. And again. Donkoo listened for a time. Eventually, it grew enough courage to look back around the corner.

The viruses were having trouble with someone. Donkoo couldn't see who they fought, but could see they shot at something hiding behind the building's wall. Then the ring-poof noise sounded again. A figure appeared out of nowhere behind a sphere of smoke.

He was average sized, obviously not a virus. Donkoo swore it was a Brawler, but didn't recognize him at all. He had brown and grey hair, the back of which tied into a pony tail. He also wore a red cape; but the most obvious characteristic was the big, blue witch hat the figure wore on his head. Donkoo saw the figure stretch out an arm like a piece of taffy in order to punch a virus. After that, the odd noise sounded again, and the figure disappeared behind a blob of smoke. The noise sounded again out of Donkoo's view. This time, a rush of snow engulfed a virus, freezing it into a block of ice. The noise sounded twice more, and then a series of sparks -what looked like fireworks- shot off in a line. Two more poof noises, then a fire attack.

As Donkoo watched in amazement, one of the convoy trucks appeared. The back side of it completely concealed the entrance to the alley in which Donkoo hid. Out the back doors, a virus busted through. It had no police uniform or anything; just casual clothing.

"Guys, hurry!" the virus called. "Get this guy in here!"

At that command, two more casual viruses emerged. They didn't have weapons, though. They came to Donkoo while carrying a stretcher. The viruses wormed their way into the alley, awkwardly maneuvering the bulky stretcher. Donkoo grew a bit paranoid when the viruses loaded it onto the stretcher, but it was too tired to really care. After Donkoo rested on the stretcher, the other two viruses picked up the stretcher at both ends and carried it to the back of their convoy. That's when Donkoo passed out.

*****

"Who's Nekrozoa???" Zugal wondered aloud.

"He's a Brawler," an excited Blue answered. "We were fighting against the Robos together!"

Blue focused back to the blurry shape.
"Is everyone else here?! I mean Smokin' and Bulet and John and, and, and-"

"Yeah, they're all here. Most of them are fighting the viruses over there," the monotone voice answered. "But we gotta hurry. We're only allowed seven minutes down here. After that, we're all dead again."

The shape didn't give Blue time to reply.
"Quickfeet. You ready to go?"

Blue saw another shape farther away from him than Nekrozoa was. Blue saw the faded form of a bald figure wearing an orange toga, bearing tiny wings on each side of his head.
"I was ready as soon as we got down here. Let's motor."

A gigantic laser shot interupted the happy reunion. The energy blast shot into the ground near the Brawlers, ravaging a gigantic hole into the roadblocks shielding Blue and his teammates.

"Damn, I'm glad Spawner got here," Blue muttered to himself.

"....this all is really fucking weird." Yarameh finally said.

"We can trust these guys," Blue assured. "Hey, Nek. You happen to know when... when I'm going with you guys?"

The shape of Nekrozoa took a moment to answer.
"...much sooner than you think, actually."

"What do you mea-"

Blue's question was violently silenced when a rifle shot pierced his skull.

*****

Donkoo was violently awakened when its bed was shaken violently. Its back arched as pain ran down it. Donkoo gritted its teeth and squeezed its eyes as it grunted, trying not to yell. A virus noticed Donkoo and held it down, struggling against the wobbly vehicle they all sat in.

"Steady with Donkoo!" a virus cautioned from the side.

Donkoo would've swiveled its head at this statement, but its neck was still way too sore for anything. Donkoo stopped gritting its teeth and looked to the convoy's ceiling.

"How do you know my name?" Donkoo asked the unknown virus.

The convoy shook after it felt like something pushed it to the side. Donkoo huffed in more pain. Other occupants of the convoy braced themselves as the driver tried to steady the vehicle. The shake managed to give off enough force to turn Donkoo's head far enough to see who it was talking to. Donkoo saw two figures on this side of the convoy's room: a perfectly healthy, greenish-black virus; and the person it saw fighting the virus police officers.

"The Brawlers told me about you," the greenish virus answered back, still steadying itself in its seat.

"Oh, yeah. Before I forget, I should tell you who's who. You can't see them, but there's Mandawl and Veek sitting over there," -the virus pointed to the other side of the convoy- "Trong is driving this sucker, and my name's Ganld."

Ganld turned to the figure next to it, the one wearing the blue witch's hat.
"Do you want to introduce yourself or what?"

The figure leaned to Donkoo.
"Greetings, mate. Name's Trinidex."

*****

"Blue!" screamed Grimpresence. The others yelled out their own various forms of surprise.

"Shit!"
"Whoa!"
"Mutha-daymn!"

All of them were knelt on the ground with shock across their faces.

Another form appeared from nowhere. The waviness faded into existance in front of them. Grimpresence managed to see the form of a man with a large afro; wearing a large, glowing halo around it.

"Nekrozoa," the form said. "We can't hold them off. They're heading this way. We have to speed this along."

"Alright, McJesus," Nekrozoa answered. "Quickfeet! Go!"

At the mention of the name "McJesus", AJ and McJunior were in a deep conversation with one another.

"What about Blue?!" Grimpresence demanded.

"I'm fine," said a young voice.

Grimpresence's tear-stricken face turned to see behind her. It was another form, but much clearer than the others.

It looked like Blue, but in a completely different way. The purely blue eyes and ruffled brown hair were still there, but this version of Blue was much smaller. And his clothes were different. This Blue has ditched the dirty burlap coat for a set of white clothing -the shirt bearing a large stripe- and a blue scarf across the neck.

"Don't worry about me," this grade-school voice urged. "I'll be okay. Just go."

"Not yet!" McJunior yelled suddenly. "Dad! I want to talk to you!"

"There's no time," the form of McJesus sadly admitted. "I'll tell Mom you said 'hi', okay?"

AJ started to tear up. "But... but dad..."

"I've had enough of this," the Quickfeet form announced.

With that, a wild gust of wind scooped up all of the living Brawlers, along with Blue's corpse. The floated in the air as the cold breeze strongly waved back and forth between all of them. And then the form of Quickfeet jetted away from the hoard of viruses, taking all of the Brawlers with them. They flew off into the Void at lightning speed, getting smaller and smaller by the milisecond. It took literally no time at all for them to completely disappear.

"Where are they going, exactly?" the form of Blue wondered.

"To Aerial Assault," the McJesus form answered. "My castle's up there. Remember?"

----------------------------------------

The zombies fell over the rubble pile. The children jumped back in shock. One zombie was on the other side of the rubble pile now, right next to all of them. It licked its lips in hunger, but a Pixel leaped up and brought it down.

Soon others followed. More zombies were falling over the side, but Pixels were able to hold them back. The children were paralyzed in fear, having no idea on what to do now.

"Psst! Over here!"

The children saw a figure in one of the holes in the alley wall. The inside of the building was dark, so not a lot of features could be deciphered, but they could notice the giant blue witch's hat.

"C'mon, kids!" he said with an Austrailian accent. The figure ran up to the children and through the crowd of Pixels. Now they could see his brown ponytail and red cape.
"Let's get out of here. Go! Get in front of me!"

Not having any better ideas, the children decided to do what this stranger said. Except for Grimpresence, what with the injured leg and all. The stranger ran to her and scooped her up. He ran back through the hole in the wall, carrying Grimpresence under his arm.

On the other side, the children waited for him. Aside from the noise of Pixels fighting zombies outside, it was rather quiet. The stranger carefully put down Grimpresence near her brother, keeping Grimpresence's leg in mind. Now he knelt down so he would look to them at eye-level.

"Hey, mates," he said with surprising calmness. "I got a shelter out in the Void. You know what I mean, right?" -The children nodded- "Well, that's where I want to take you guys. You up for it?"

----------------------------------------

All of them walked on a road of light in the middle of a black darkness, except for a certain few that wouldn't be suited to their destination. It was a giant crowd walking on the nearly invisible road, heading toward the bright light at the end of the tunnel. Blue was happy to see his friends again.

"How do you think they'll do?" Blue asked.

John was the closest to him. "Oh, they'll be fine. They're tough. They'll make it."

"Who was the jerk wearing my armor?" Zarth asked, more with sarcasm than anger.

BeatNix hopped up near Zarth. "That was my main man, Nick. Don't you be talkin' bad about 'im!"

"Oh, I sure won't forget a threat from the oh-so-mighty one!"

Both of them shared a laugh.

"Now, why am I not allowed to stay with them?" Blue wondered.

"We talked about this with the Big Man," Omnipresence decided to answer. "He said that you've pretty much done your part. You weren't needed down there."

"Gee, when you say it like that, God sounds like a jerk..." Blue smirked.

"It doesn't matter, really," said McJesus.

"Yeah," Balto-Boy continued. "The plan is that the war's going to kill everyone anyways."

[Hat Salesman]

IT'S ALL OVER. WAAAAAAAHH

[McJesus]

D: :D
I have mixed emotions.