The Grand Battle S2G1! [Round Six: Eddelin City]

Originally posted on MSPA by Schazer.

---

Th

That was

Hoss, watching more interesting proceedings through whatever ocular overlays he possessed, flashed a glance in Xadrez' direction.

an immeasurable relief, the tactician finally managed. My thanks

"Think nothing of it," said the cyborg, making it clear he had no real intention to. "My regret's that I couldn't fix it. It's an intriguing weapon."

There was Ovoid-backed silence, while the ghost silently struggled to pull himself together.

"Let me see that orb."

Xadrez didn't so much relinquish it as gravity ignored it, as it slipped out of his hand and into Hoss' outstretched one. The tyrant shuffled it about in his fingers, hefted it to eye-level, and kept manhandling it in a manner wholly uninteresting to Xadrez before putting it aside. His smile just made Xadrez' heart sink even further.

You are the hand of silver

"Yes."

Good

tell me

is your goal domination of the multiverse by humankind

The cyborg considered, affixing Xadrez in the corner of his eye. He smirked.

"Yes."

---

"Hah! That's what you get for not letting me join your stupid Hoss-Hater's Club!"

"What? Oh, come on chainsaw chick, I didn't mean it that way-"

"All good," rumbled Brooklyn. She'd taken a break from wholesale bigoted-menslaughter when one of them had (succesfully) sniped her with an (ineffectual) death ray. The good doctor had been just as impressed with Brooklyn's "housing arrangement", and had obligingly fitted a speaker without too much trouble. The pair perched on the roof of a gutted high-rise, spasmodic sun on their backs as they watched the beige tide.

"This is booooooring," Anarchy eventually declared. The chainsaw, in as apocalyptic a mindset as she was and unable to muster sympathy for a horde of fellow victims, had to agree. "Anything that sucks less going on around town, d'y'reckon?"

Brooklyn zoomed off ahead, looping lazily while her fellow inventrix's jetpack warmed up. "Not a clue! I haven't been back since I woke up; Emily chased my non-existent, technically-undead backside out of town before I could tell her where to stick it."

"Lame," was Anarchy's sympathetic response.

"It's not that bad," shrugged Brooklyn. Somehow. "Oh hey, woah, is that Konka Rar?"

The still-extant woman flipped down a scope on her goggles, adroitly dodging an oncoming billboard.

"Nah, those're plastic skeletons."

"Lame." Anarchy glared at the chainsaw, but it didn't appear to be mocking her mannerisms. Maybe. Kind of hard to tell. The two women tailed Gadget and his "army" from on high, until a far less boring scene presented itself in Central Park.

"Oh man, there's three fake Rars! I remember a few idiots trying it back in the day before I, y'know, became all awesome and everything-"

"How can you tell? You say you met the guy? Lich?"

"Yeah, those two are total fakes as well. I mean, I didn't really get a chance to talk to him much-"

"The silent type?"

The inventor touched down lightly on another impressive lookout, working her shoulders a bit. She'd brought jetpack technology a long way, but they were still pretty clunky devices.

"Nah, that robo-dick took care of me Round 1."

"Ouch. Sorry," she added, after Anarchy glared at her. The woman just burst out laughing, probably because a contrite haunted chainsaw was an amusing prospect.

"Don't sweat it. I'm alive again, and Hand of Stupid probably is too. Hiding like a goddamn coward somewhere, now that he knows I'm after him."

"Wait, so he killed you before all those non-humans he wants to dominate?"

"I know!" wailed Anarchy, throwing up her hands in disgust. "The jerk's so pathetic, he only had the guts to take on a girl! That meatball or whatever didn't even look that tough!"

"Ugh." Brooklyn growled, in female solidarity. "Men."

Anarchy sulked for a while, moodily slapping the muzzle of her death ray against her thigh. Judging from the negotiations, the Guard had not entirely thought their plan through. "We could shoot one of them," Dr. Anarchy ventured, cocking her raygun like a pistol and muttering "pzzeow" under her breath.

"Do it."

"Eeh, actually, I dunno if my baby's got the range-"

"Doooooo it."

One liberal splattering of blue-green shapeshifter later:

"Hah! I knew it was a fake one."

"How!? It looked like the real thing until you shot it!"

"I," grinned Anarchy, "am a genius. Just saying," she huffed, somehow correctly-interpreting a belch of smoke as a reproachful glare. "Hey, d'you reckon that tree's gotten bigger since we got here?"

---

what was the purpose of the orb

"I made it - rather, a different instance of myself made it. It facilitates trans-multiversal communication between humans. As such, him and I communicated."

and you agree with his motives, queried Xadrez. He couldn't even be bothered looking the cyborg in the face. Hoss considered for a moment, then settled for a shrug.

"Humanity in its entirety - as I knew it before this battle, at any rate - has no place being the plaything of these Grandmasters." The tyrant allowed himself a small smile. "Having said that, if a single mind were responsible to manage what was left behind, I'm certain mine - or that of my contemporary - would be up to the task."

Xadrez rubbed his hand absently. It still stung, like splinters of knife were lodged in there shrieking.

and you have no qualms telling me the truth

"Better you hear it from myself, than constantly doubting our cause because of what that rock told you." Hoss' grin was almost genial. "Besides-" one arm swept a gash in the sky, exposing the edge of the jittering, roiling tan, too many limbs and alien appendages thrashing in its wake "-you could care less what fate befalls the multiverse, provided the Grandmasters are destroyed, yes?"

I



no

but

despite how little you think of my heartless bisected undying inhuman self heed this

no elite array of great minds will ever do more than leave the faintest most infinitesmial mar upon the grandmasters

raw power nothing less will suffice in toppling them

no amount of trickery will insinuate you into your coveted title of lord of the multiverse

not unless the grandmasters would humour a mortal walking amongst them

calling himself a god

"Your point?"

are you and the ovoid strong enough to destroy them all

and i ask not only of how devastating a rend you can tear in the fabric of reality

but whether you have strength enough in will to settle for no less

than their absolute annihilation

The tyrant was impassive, machine hijacking man so humanity's most powerful abstractions could compute an answer.

You know

i have realised that we possess our similarities

"Really."

Yes

in that perhaps

given the strangest of circumstances we may admit to another like us

that it has been a long

long time

since we could deign to think of ourselves as truly human



You know what

do what you wish silver hand

You will either usurp the bastard throne of our overlords or you will not

and if you were never capable of it your machinations are of no concern to me

The tyrant scowled, but Xadrez had already drifted off. He needed to leave the Ovoid's interior, glittering dully as it was every which way he looked with splinters of the knife. Taunting him. Some final retort of Hoss' was lost as something insinuated-punched its way through, and shoved the beige aside. The tactician barely even felt it, deft as the hand which carved its way through was.

He recognised the voice, though. He didn't dare turn to face it, lest his own expression betray him.

"There you are."