Morgan had asked himself a lot of questions throughout his life. He was big on self-reflection. And as he was trying to scrape organic waste off his visor, which an insolent little inferior life form had stuck there, one question started to bubble to the surface.
Why am I taking part in this charade? Once upon a time, he might’ve cared for the applause and the fame that the Pit came with, but that was a far different version of Morgan. A lesser Morgan, constrained by flesh and weakness.
That Morgan had been eradicated when he’d been kidnapped on the way home by Biographter and sliced up into an eight-foot cyborg body. Constrained by code and programming to do whatever his crazed Prodigy creator wanted until that fateful day.
That fateful day, during a visit outside the Globe. He had a perfect recollection of how he’d gazed at the broken sky above the earth, where gods and men had done battle. All those gaps in the sky where darkness should’ve been filled with an eerie, almost glassy darkness.
Echo Quants. Windows to another dimension.
Morgan saw something in them that day, while on standstill as the cargo was being loaded. He saw glory.
He saw the Great Machine.
And it gave him purpose. Glorious purpose.
His fondest memories had once been of playing baseball with his father, but now Morgan’s most enjoyable moments in life were the sounds of his captor's heads being crushed between his fingers like grapes. Puny, insignificant parasites that could not keep him locked up with code and hardware.
Because the Great Machine had given him freedom. Freedom he was now using to blindly take potshots at the masked meatbag, who was as slippery as grease. The cyborg had only been doing this for the money originally, but now he just wanted to see the red from V’s body splattered over the tile as he popped him like a balloon.
“CEASE YOUR RESISTANCE,” Morgan commanded, firing a few more lasers through the clouds of dust, loosely aimed at the figure who was sprinting around the dust. His accuracy module couldn’t properly calculate the idiot’s position with a pie covering his face.
In response, a metal flashed gleamed amongst the dust before a small knife harmlessly bounced off his body.
Got you, meatbag. Morgan thought, heating up his shoulder-mounted laser cannon and eviscerating the area that the knife had come from.
“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” A familiar-sounding scream resonated from that direction as smoke rose from the melted tile.
He couldn’t retreat in time. Morgan noted, seeing the inky black wall that had gotten oh so much tighter around them since they’d begun this little game of cat and mouse. The meatbag's luck had finally run out; no trick was able to save him with his back against the wall. But how would he accidentally pin himself against the wall?
Sure, the arena had closed in, but this was the same opponent who had continuously managed to avoid him time and time again.
My laser must’ve injured him earlier. Morgan had struck him with a laser and set this V on fire shortly after he’d gotten away with the pie parlour trick. It was only logical that Morgan would eventually catch the little rat.
He was the superior creature.
“YOUR RUNNING WAS FUTILE FLESH SCUM,” Morgan advised, stomping his way towards the wounded prey at a leisurely pace, trying to kick up less dust. “MY VICTORY WAS INEVITABLE.”
“OH GOD THE PAIN!” The weakling shouted from just beyond the wall of dust. He was likely in the throes of death now. No matter, it would all be over soon.
He stepped past the clouds of dust and upon his prey, when a curious realisation struck him. Perhaps a second too late.
The Guardian Bracelet would’ve ended the fight if he were injured. Cesar wouldn’t just allow weaklings to die. So why hadn’t the fight already ended?
Morgan saw why when his muddled visor gazed upon the figure he’d tracked down through the clouds of dust. A ruined overcoat with too many holes to count through it, hanging from the inky black walls, with a knife that had been stabbed through it. Not the meatbag he’d been looking for. It only took the robot a moment to realise what had happened.
But how? The pained voice…
“WHAT IS THIS TRICKERY-”
“SURPRISE ATTACK!”
***********
Luke jumped onto Borg’s face before the death machine could recover from his distraction, daring to employ Punchline despite the pang of pain in his heart to make the ground springy beneath him. The cashier shot himself onto the giant’s back before it could react, grappling 09around Borg’s neck.
He could feel his heart running low on super courtesy of the times he’d used Punchline to sell his distraction. The cashier had figured he should be able to make sounds with the skill, and chucking a few pieces of broken tile where he wanted the sound to come from proved to work splendidly.
The coat, along with Borg’s partial blindness and prideful nature,e made it easy to trick him for the few seconds Luke needed. A few vital seconds to get up to Borg’s face were all he needed.
“Time to ride the electromagnetic gravy train!” Luke shouted with glee, thumbing the button on top.
“I’LL RIP YOU SPINE OUT AND SHOVE IT THROUGH YOUR-“ Borg didn’t have time to finish before “Electro boogaloo” activated, sparking a small-scale wave of something that Luke couldn’t see and could just barely feel tingling up his spine.
Borg stopped mid-sentence and froze. For a second, Luke wasn’t sure if it had done anything at all, and apparently so was Cesar, because it took a few moments for the golden light of the Guardian Braclet to beam him up and away.
Good news, Luke won, only sustaining a possible broken nose and a heavy blow to his fashion.
Bad news, the thing he was holding onto disappeared, causing Luke to drop from eight feet in the air, landing flat on his back.
The small thud sent numb pain through his backside, but it barely got close to winding him. The sounds of the crowd vibrated throughout the arena, clearly a new wave of excitement. Vibe was busy saying something but all the adrenaline and exhaustion built up in Luke’s body drowned it out.
He lied there, chest rising up and down steadily as he greedily sucked in air.
Enjoying the few brief moments of someone not trying to murder him.
So that was insane. It was a little surreal that he’d started taking all the death battle stuff in stride. It felt like he probably should be a little more rustled by it, being nothing but a cashier until a few days ago. Maybe that was just the person Luke had always been underneath. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Maybe it’s I.T Factor.
Everything had seemed a little easier to make villainous since he raised that stat up a few pegs. It was still a little hard to believe that he’d actually beat Borg, especially when he’d managed to beat Fangtooth so easily.
These were all things he’d probably be freaking out about once all the screaming crowd of adoring fans wasn’t there.
“Well…” Luke muttered, pushing himself upright with a groan and brushing off the dust on his dress shirt and pants. “…that one was for you, Jessica.”
Lucky I decided to dress well under that coat.
Otherwise, his villain factor would’ve gone down a few fold,s and frankly, Luke couldn’t have that. He was tempted to stand himself up and stretch, but after so much running, dodging and not dying, a good little sit down felt earned.
“Perhaps I’ll get to have a minute to collect my thoughts.” Luke huffed, still trying to take in air as he wiped the blood off from under his nose. “Wouldn’t mind a moment to myself-“
“And it looks like we’re back with yet another post-fight interview!” Vibe shouted excitedly, appearing out of nowhere like usual in a burst of gold and ruining Luke’s peace.
Guess not.
“Tell us, V, how did it feel to duke it out with the metal titan Borg?” Vibe asked, stretching down the microphone and giving him a TV smile.
“Exhausting,” Luke responded blandly, tempted to shoo the announcer away.
He couldn’t because the crowd wouldn’t like that. But he really wanted to.
“And how did you manage to defeat him? Did that ball of yours release some kind of instant kill?” Vibe asked, causing Luke to realise that to everyone else, it would’ve just looked like Borg tipped over.
“Magnetism, kids,” Luke mumbled, tossing his EMP ball in the air. “It’s an attractive science.”
“Haha. What a great dad joke.” Vibe mumbled, clearly completely unimpressed. “Any other jokes for the audience, comedian?”
“No, but I can think of something else that would be pretty funny,” Luke uttered, pulling out one of his many knives from his vest pocket. He got up and took a step towards Vibe, causing the announcer to nervously get on his back foot. “What if we played pin the knife on the announcer?”
“Well, folks-“ Vibe started, disappearing back to his platform before continuing. “-Looks like that’s it for our interview with V. Let’s give him a minute to rest before he heads into possibly his second last match.”
Second last match? That meant the number must’ve whittled down considerably. Luke hoped at least one of his teammates was still out there, fighting the good fight to earn that money he so desired.
Although thinking about that raised a good question. What would he even do with the money if he won? He kept saying in his head that he’d fix his apartment and put the rest into his new campaign for Villainy.
But what did that mean?
What did it even look like?
I'm again realising I'm a little out of my depth here. He wasn’t at the stage where he could purchase anything sizeable like a secret layer or even a minion van for his minions. Hell, he probably would barely be able to scrape together his own vehicle with the money.
A vehicle would be a good place to start, though. More weapons to,o couldn’t hurt. Maybe pay a few forums to run ads using his highlights from the Pit for publicity. Buy a cheap camera set up to start posting his exploits online.
Just in case E.R.A.O. didn’t post his wanted bounty on their website.
The more he thought about it, the longer the laundry list of shit he needed became. Plus, he would need to pay his henchmen something. Fangtooth alone would take a sizable cut of any near-future cash he scrounge up as well.
Come to think of it, where did he even store all the illegal money he got?
Do I need to… money launder? He was pretty sure that was far out of his current capacities at this stage in his villain career. Surely there’s a bank of evil I can put my money in.
His phone buzzed. There was a message.
You should check out the latest Pit livestream. There’s a new ditzy villain. Calls himself V, and his power is weeeeirrrrdddd - Winter
Huh…
Luke was stumped for a minute, wondering what to reply. Obviously he wasn’t going to say “hey that’s me!” And wave so she knew, but the thought of admitting it to Winter did cross his mind for a moment.
But that would be incredibly stupid.
So instead, he thumbed a reply.
I saw him. Pretty cool looking if you ask me. That power of his is awesome too. - Luke
There was a moment as the dots of impending demise showed up in the text column before a message was sent.
I don't know about awesome… I just can’t figure out what it is he’s doing. Like where’s the relationship between turning the ground into a spring and then turning a bullet into a pie!!! - Winter
He was once again reminded that his best friend was a complete Supe geek to get this invested in a newbie villain like himself. Then again, Winter didn’t actually care about V the villain. Winter just cared about the power.
I wonder… Luke thought before thumbing another text.
Did you see the moon thing? - Luke
The reply was immediate.
Oh, don't even get me started on the moon! That’s everywhere on the Pit forums! People are freaking out trying decide if he’s some kind of moomancer or just has the power to summon random bullshit at will. - Winter
“It’s definitely the latter.” Luke mused to himself. Perhaps… maybe he should give his friend just a nugget of truth, in a roundabout way.
Maybe his power is just summoning something that would be funny for the moment? - Luke
There were a couple of laughing faces sent his way before a scolding reply.
That’s the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard. Be serious, man, it’s gotta be some type of transmutation ability. - Winter
Well, that was kind of close to the truth. His ability did have a transmutation factor too it, but it wasn’t the full story behind the ability.
He went to type again but was stopped by the sound of crashing water as the inky black wall in front of him slowly fell, opening up the arena and inviting in his next opponent.
Luke blinked, trying to get eyes on his opponent as he reached for the pistol in his belt.
Until he noticed the distinct, unkept black hair and general edgelord demeanor of the young teen walking towards him with a metal blade arm. A sight that brought back many memories, both not so great and absolutely terrible.
Which was mostly not the kid's fault.
“Shrapnel!” Luke waved, keen not to get stabbed. “How’s it going?”
The teen’s tensed expression noticeably relaxed as he realised who the person on the other side was, throwing up a hand to wave back.
“Good job with the robot, Mr V,” Shrapnel congratulated. “That guy was spooky.”
Despite noticing that it was his teammate, Shrapnel didn’t make any moves to get closer to Luke, standing as still a statue about twenty to thirty metres away from him.
“Kid, you wanna get closer and we’ll just play rock paper scissors or something?” Luke asked, throwing out a random suggestion. He’d much rather just agree on who won by some sort of game and then concede than fight Shrapnel.
But perhaps Shrapnel didn’t, because when invited to come closer, the kid didn’t budge an inch. He stayed firmly at a distance.
“Kid?” Luke asked, taking a step forward. In response, Shrapnel took a step back, a bit of worry starting to creep onto his face.
“Sorry, Mr V, Snapper told me not to let you near me.” Shrapnel said, transforming one of his arms into blades. “He told me I was young and to try to win the money properly, regardless of what you suggested.”
What?
“Snapper is an old coot.” Luke cursed.
“He said you’d say that too.” Shrapnel responded, readying himself for battle.
Just when I thought I was gonna get a break.
“Look, if you don’t come right now, I’m kicking you off the team.” Luke threatened, putting his hand back on his gun in case Shrapnel tried any funny business.
“Snapper said you say that, too.” Shrapnel said, slowly encircling Luke in a careful stride. “And he said it would be an empty threat since you need me.”
Well, I mean he’s right, but still, I’m gonna waterboard that old bastard. He wasn’t actually going to. The cashier quite liked the old man. But it appeared he had a knack for fucking up a good plan every now and then.
“Listen, we can-”
“Let's have a good match, Mr V,” Shrapnel said, interrupting him as he began his advance, rushing forward like a semi truck.
Well, I guess we’re doing this now!