Re: The Savage Brawl [Round 4: Small 50s Town]
03-06-2012, 11:04 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by Not The Author.
The battle was not going well.
Certainly, the alien invasion force had suffered heavy losses. That wave of magic had been invaluable for rushing some of his heavier units, and was really the only reason he’d been able to build the massive amalgam of pasta and burger that was knocking saucers out of the sky. He had lost many of his troops as well, but he could simply churn out more from the meaty slush that was forming around the Motherburger’s feet. He was slowly but surely losing the fight… but this was not the problem.
Gormand was a strategist. Most of those he fought against viewed him as a horrible monster that destroyed all he came into contact with, and while this was technically true, some traits implied by that description were not. He tried to avoid brute-forcing his way to victory, despite his troops being for all intents and purposes entirely disposable. He rarely fought battles he didn’t think he could win, unless he was intentionally trying to stall an advance. Oftentimes he would raid settlements to whittle away his enemy’s morale, or capture hostages to divert his enemies’ forces, rather than simply raze his conquests. Always, always, he fought for a purpose. Mere territorial acquisition was not enough of a reason for him to fight; he always sought some strategic gain from his battles. No point taking what you can’t hold, after all.
This fight against the alien force was purposeless, and that was why it was not going well. It was stress relief, an attempt to return to normalcy, self-serving wonton destruction. There was no reason for it, ultimately – this round would pass and the Virus would destroy itself trying to overextend its influence. His army would almost certainly not join him in transition, and another magical burst like that accompanying the Giant’s death was incredibly unlikely in the upcoming rounds. As soon as someone died, he would be back at square zero.
It seemed to him that the most he could do at any given time was kill a contestant on his own terms. But even that, the greater conflict, the Savage Brawl (She’d called it that, hadn’t she? He didn’t quite remember. How long ago had this contest begun?) had an echo of futility to it. What was the point of it all? The Cultivator had dumped the responsibility on another’s shoulders, and apparently wasn’t as indisposed as she might have liked them to believe. Had she abandoned them? Were they just a plaything of which she had grown tired? He didn’t discard the possibility, but it certainly didn’t seem like some grandiose master plan was underway.
Nevertheless, he was trapped in this… game, and loathe as he was to admit, he would have to play by its rules or end up caught with his metaphorical pants down. Which brought him back to the question that had been bothering him since Hoss came crashing through a wall:
Who to kill?
Ekelhaft was the obvious choice. He was the most dangerous and deadly of the contestants, and given too much time could turn them against each other with his aura of insanity. But Gormand’s ultimate goal was to kill the Cultivator, and Ekelhaft had allegedly eradicated everything on his home planet. If anyone was going to kill the Cultivator, that blob was one of the most likely to succeed.
…Had Ekelhaft actually killed anyone yet? Hoss had killed Anarchy (or she’d killed herself, arguably) and Calm and Diego had each… died at some point…? Who had killed them? This was going to bug him for a while, he was sure.
The problem with killing Ekelhaft was that Ekelhaft was an easy target to rally the others behind. He was an immediate threat, and once he was gone, the immediate threats would be each other. Ziirphael he’d met only once before, Hoss almost certainly had his own agenda, and Konka Rar used (admittedly dead) people as disposable tools on a regular basis. They weren’t unified as a single front yet; he couldn’t rely on the others to help him kill the Cultivator. This was largely his own fault – in retrospect, he should have spent his time strengthening the group rather than himself. At least those three could probably be reasoned with. His best bet was still to kill Ekelhaft.
And now, thanks to generous-if-involuntary contributions by the good people of Jedesburg, he had the means to do so.
As soon as Gormand was sure Hoss had gone, the floor opened beneath him, and he dropped into the school’s basement. Here, the plague’s touch was relatively subdued – its attentions had been redirected to the device at the center of the room, rather than the room itself. One not acquainted with the warlord might fancy the device to be built of hastily dismantled microwave ovens and a refrigerator or two. They would almost be right, but for the word “built.”
Somehow, despite the very earth crashing down in a wave of liquefied offal at his touch, anything manufactured for the preparation of food was immune to the virus’ transmutations. Or the virus had some affinity for appliances, or… something. It bothered Gormand that he didn’t know how this particular facet of the Virus worked. Not only was his race was atechnological, the actual machines the virus could forge didn’t seem to conform to either magical or technological conventions. They were too useful to pass up, though, as they were his only real source of heavily armored troops. …And things like this device.
The device was an appropriately-scaled eyepiece, all stainless steel and shiny white plastic. Bulky vents took up either side of the device, and flexible metal tubes snaked out from the frame at irregular intervals. A dim light lazily circled the inner rim, barely illuminating the foggy fisheye lens. The warlord glared at it warily, before giving up and jamming the thing on his face. It secured itself with a quiet squelch, and began the slow process of Death By Irradiation. Or, as he sometimes liked to think of it, chemotherapy.
His five-story fall was cushioned by the thick fleshy stew bubbling away beneath his burger behemoth. He had no idea where to start looking for the blob, no faith in his competition to help, and no resources to spare from the ongoing conflict. As he dragged himself from the ooze, the meatball sighed. The sooner this thing was gone and done with, the better.
He wasn’t entirely sure what thing specifically, but at this point he’d settle for just about everything.
The battle was not going well.
Certainly, the alien invasion force had suffered heavy losses. That wave of magic had been invaluable for rushing some of his heavier units, and was really the only reason he’d been able to build the massive amalgam of pasta and burger that was knocking saucers out of the sky. He had lost many of his troops as well, but he could simply churn out more from the meaty slush that was forming around the Motherburger’s feet. He was slowly but surely losing the fight… but this was not the problem.
Gormand was a strategist. Most of those he fought against viewed him as a horrible monster that destroyed all he came into contact with, and while this was technically true, some traits implied by that description were not. He tried to avoid brute-forcing his way to victory, despite his troops being for all intents and purposes entirely disposable. He rarely fought battles he didn’t think he could win, unless he was intentionally trying to stall an advance. Oftentimes he would raid settlements to whittle away his enemy’s morale, or capture hostages to divert his enemies’ forces, rather than simply raze his conquests. Always, always, he fought for a purpose. Mere territorial acquisition was not enough of a reason for him to fight; he always sought some strategic gain from his battles. No point taking what you can’t hold, after all.
This fight against the alien force was purposeless, and that was why it was not going well. It was stress relief, an attempt to return to normalcy, self-serving wonton destruction. There was no reason for it, ultimately – this round would pass and the Virus would destroy itself trying to overextend its influence. His army would almost certainly not join him in transition, and another magical burst like that accompanying the Giant’s death was incredibly unlikely in the upcoming rounds. As soon as someone died, he would be back at square zero.
It seemed to him that the most he could do at any given time was kill a contestant on his own terms. But even that, the greater conflict, the Savage Brawl (She’d called it that, hadn’t she? He didn’t quite remember. How long ago had this contest begun?) had an echo of futility to it. What was the point of it all? The Cultivator had dumped the responsibility on another’s shoulders, and apparently wasn’t as indisposed as she might have liked them to believe. Had she abandoned them? Were they just a plaything of which she had grown tired? He didn’t discard the possibility, but it certainly didn’t seem like some grandiose master plan was underway.
Nevertheless, he was trapped in this… game, and loathe as he was to admit, he would have to play by its rules or end up caught with his metaphorical pants down. Which brought him back to the question that had been bothering him since Hoss came crashing through a wall:
Who to kill?
Ekelhaft was the obvious choice. He was the most dangerous and deadly of the contestants, and given too much time could turn them against each other with his aura of insanity. But Gormand’s ultimate goal was to kill the Cultivator, and Ekelhaft had allegedly eradicated everything on his home planet. If anyone was going to kill the Cultivator, that blob was one of the most likely to succeed.
…Had Ekelhaft actually killed anyone yet? Hoss had killed Anarchy (or she’d killed herself, arguably) and Calm and Diego had each… died at some point…? Who had killed them? This was going to bug him for a while, he was sure.
The problem with killing Ekelhaft was that Ekelhaft was an easy target to rally the others behind. He was an immediate threat, and once he was gone, the immediate threats would be each other. Ziirphael he’d met only once before, Hoss almost certainly had his own agenda, and Konka Rar used (admittedly dead) people as disposable tools on a regular basis. They weren’t unified as a single front yet; he couldn’t rely on the others to help him kill the Cultivator. This was largely his own fault – in retrospect, he should have spent his time strengthening the group rather than himself. At least those three could probably be reasoned with. His best bet was still to kill Ekelhaft.
And now, thanks to generous-if-involuntary contributions by the good people of Jedesburg, he had the means to do so.
As soon as Gormand was sure Hoss had gone, the floor opened beneath him, and he dropped into the school’s basement. Here, the plague’s touch was relatively subdued – its attentions had been redirected to the device at the center of the room, rather than the room itself. One not acquainted with the warlord might fancy the device to be built of hastily dismantled microwave ovens and a refrigerator or two. They would almost be right, but for the word “built.”
Somehow, despite the very earth crashing down in a wave of liquefied offal at his touch, anything manufactured for the preparation of food was immune to the virus’ transmutations. Or the virus had some affinity for appliances, or… something. It bothered Gormand that he didn’t know how this particular facet of the Virus worked. Not only was his race was atechnological, the actual machines the virus could forge didn’t seem to conform to either magical or technological conventions. They were too useful to pass up, though, as they were his only real source of heavily armored troops. …And things like this device.
The device was an appropriately-scaled eyepiece, all stainless steel and shiny white plastic. Bulky vents took up either side of the device, and flexible metal tubes snaked out from the frame at irregular intervals. A dim light lazily circled the inner rim, barely illuminating the foggy fisheye lens. The warlord glared at it warily, before giving up and jamming the thing on his face. It secured itself with a quiet squelch, and began the slow process of Death By Irradiation. Or, as he sometimes liked to think of it, chemotherapy.
His five-story fall was cushioned by the thick fleshy stew bubbling away beneath his burger behemoth. He had no idea where to start looking for the blob, no faith in his competition to help, and no resources to spare from the ongoing conflict. As he dragged himself from the ooze, the meatball sighed. The sooner this thing was gone and done with, the better.
He wasn’t entirely sure what thing specifically, but at this point he’d settle for just about everything.