Re: Pitched Combat [Round 5: Garden of Shades]
09-10-2010, 09:55 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by MalkyTop.
The Manikin was growing quite large now. It was hard for anything to hold it, as the sheer girth of it was just impossible to keep down. Though the plant man had continuously tried to tie it down, the Manikin easily gulped him down before devoring any lingering vines that clung desperately onto it. It was growing to be quite the monstrosity.
Many of the small gardeners were prodding at it with their sharp shears. Rong's scales were weak enough to be cut, but the wounds were annoying at best. Blood seemed rather tedious and unnecessary to the Manikin, but it seemed to come with the whole 'powerful dragon' schtick so it'd have to just deal with the whole thing it supposed. It dealt with the whole thing by whipping its tail around, knocking several gardeners over, allowing it to devour them as well. They didn't taste as good as the fruit. Inky. Bitter. Disappointing.
As more gardeners swarmed around it, still making brave and useless attempts to damage it in any serious way, the Manikin pondered what to do next.
It remembered its goal of enacting vengence upon the dragons. It realized that it had gotten too excited with the appearance of the tasty fruit around it. It should finish its work and then it could gorge itself even more. It shouldn't be too hard to kill the dragons now, to be honest. It had grown much and it was pretty sure they hadn't grown at all.
The Manikin experimentally flapped its wings which, although rather developed now, were still not big enough to be able to support its weight. Still, it found (after knocking down numerous trees and gardeners) that when it jumped around, the wings did help it glide further. With a satisfied roar, it jumped, bounded off the top of a tree (which also fell over), and glided away from the destroyed patch of land.
It would be nice if it could find those dragons quickly and get it over with. Still, it thought as it managed to grab a person off the ground and flip him into its mouth, it was in no hurry.
----------------------------------------------------------------
"Dammit! I hate that guy even more now! Let's go already, I need to vent! Maybe there's another stupid wizard going around that I can kill..."
"Mmhmm," Right replied vaguely, still glancing around. "I think I hear something."
"I mean making some sort of weird monstrosity wasn't good enough, he had to go tampering with its minds too?" Rong paused. "I think I just insulted myself."
"No, I'm being serious. Don't you hear it?"
"I don't hear anything," Rong said impatiently, though as she said it, she could hear what he was talking about. It was one of those sounds she usually filed as 'background noises' and then ignored. It was a persistant buzzing, bug-like in quality. Rong scowled at this. She was never a fan of bugs. (Really, who was?) If any of the pesky things came near her, she wouldn't hesitate to burn them down. (That isn't saying much, now is it?) Though usually the damn things buzzed around too fast for her to even aim right and fireballs were not well known for accuracy in the first place and it always seemed that just when she thought she got all of them, a whole freaking militant pops up out of nowhere and...
"Let's get going," Rong muttered, not in the mood to deal with annoying bugs.
"Let's," Right agreed and immediately started towards the buzzing. Rong pulled back.
"I meant away, not towards!"
"I'm curious about this noise, though," Right insisted, tugging harder towards the sound.
"What's so interesting about a bunch of bugs?" Rong shouted back. Eemp stumbled a little when Right stopped pulling to stare blankly at the blue dragon.
"...Why...why did you assume they were bugs...?" Rong managed to shuffle around uncomfortably despite having no feet to shuffle.
"I dunno, it sounds like bugs. Doesn't it sound like bugs?"
Right listened some more. "Not...bugs specifically...it's not as though insects have some sort of copyright on buzzing noises. It could be a machine. Or...somebody making a particularly irritating buzzing sound..."
"Somebody making a buzzing noise that sounds as though it's coming from a crowd...?"
"It could be a collection of machines," Right shot back defensively. "The point I'm just trying to make is that you can't--" But he couldn't finish stating his point for at that moment, the buzzing noise found them.
As Rong had thought, they were bugs. But they were the most horrifying bugs she had ever seen. If terror was in bug form, it would probably look like this.
Bugs half a foot long, collected in the largest swarm she had ever seen. She didn't even know bug swarms could get that large. Their jaw-mandible-claw things had barbs and their tail had barbs and their whole freaking body had barbs and she would not be surprised if there were barbs on their wings and god she hated bugs so much.
"...Maybe these pollinate the trees," Right commented. Rong responded by flaming the hell out of the disturbing suckers.
Some sluggish ones did indeed get incinerated, but the swarm was still ridiculously huge and maybe she was imagining things, but it was getting bigger and god she hated bugs so much.
Another large burst of flame did little to lower the numbers. "Pollinate?" Rong gasped out. "Those things look like they were built to eat your face off!"
"I see your point," Right conceeded.
Though fire wasn't killing a lot of them, it seemed to be discouraging them from doing anything, though when Eemp tried backing away, they still followed, apparently still intent on eating something even if it did spew fire, seemingly confident that they would somehow get around that pesky obstacle and goddammit she hated bugs so goddamn much.
"Insects are adverse to smoke, aren't they?" Right said, finally looking a little bit nervous. It was only a fraction of the nervousness he should have felt, but at least it was a start. "Maybe if you just keep smoking, they'll leave..."
"Smoke makes my throat itch," Rong whined
"Would you rather let them eat your face off?"
"Well, they won't eat my face off as long as I keep spitting fire at them!"
"And fire won't burn your throat?"
Rong paused to ward off the death bugs again. "NO!" she screeched with frustration. "It WON'T!"
And the two would have continued squabbling had another figure suddenly appeared, nonchalantly caught many of the swarming bugs, and ate them.
If the bugs were disconcerted about being prey rather than predator as they were used to, they didn't show it. As soon as the crunch of several unlucky insects sounded and the juice squirted down the newcomer's maw, the swarm angrily descended upon him. But it seemed that they weren't able to eat him. He just stood there calmly as they buzzed about them, every once in a while reaching out to eat some more.
After a few minutes of confused buzzing, the swarm decided that nothing here was worth the trouble and flew away. At least most of them did. Some lingered, still attracted to the smell of their own juices and were quickly eaten as well.
"It looks as though that fruit would be hard to juice," the stranger said calmly and now that he was not being obscured by clouds of super-bugs, Right could get a good look at him.
He was tall, tall enough to be vaguely threatening. But even if you weren't scared of tall people, you might be at least somewhat disconcerted by the large horns that curled over his head. Or maybe by the ridiculously long tail that twisted around and tapered before suddenly forming a sharp point. Or maybe the claws. Then again, he was wearing semi-formal clothing, which sort of off-set any threatening characteristics about him.
After a moment, Right managed out a "Really?" just as Rong settled for a more direct "Who the hell are you?"
The demon stared at them, lashing his tail contemplatively. "I suppose you can say...I'm the supervisor of this whole property you are tresspassing on," he said simply.
"You'd think the Organizer would watch over his own gardens," Right commented wryly.
"Oh, think much, do you?" the horned supervisor said in the most scathingly innocent way imaginable. Right was too busy being surprised to make a retort.
"I'll have you know," he continued, his tone getting hotter until it was almost scalding, "I am the organizer of this whole operation. I thought of it, I built it, I tended to it, I hired workers when it grew larger than I had originally thought and I don't appreciate tresspassers."
"No, wait, we didn't mean 'an organizer', it's the Organizer," Rong cut in, either not realizing or not caring that the supervisor wasn't in the mood for interjection.
"You know," Right added. "Capitalized."
The demonic supervizor glared coldly at them and slowly shook his head. "I will never understand how religious zealots keep managing to get in here. Well, since you somehow got into this pocket dimension, I'd appreciate it if you leave."
"Well, because of the aforementioned capitalized Organizer," Right replied almost as testily as the supervizer, "A few beings, including us, have been transported here unwillingly. Meaning that there are two other 'trespassers' and none of us can traverse dimensions. So we're stuck here."
The demon at least looked a little surprised at this, but he quickly returned to his sour countenance. "Ah."
"'Ah?' That's all you have to say?"
The supervisor shrugged. "We've had worse problems."
"Worse than a pyromaniac, a jumpy pyrokinetic and the wooden embodiment of gluttony?" Right demanded.
"Yes," he replied without much thought. "Ah, actually...yes." Right grunted, getting quite aggravated by this constant barrage of sardonic. "About every year."
"Oh really." Right tried his hardest to sound mordant. "And what sort of annual catastrophe does an isolated dimension of strange fruit trees undergo?"
---------------------------------------------
Jordan and Maxwell hadn't walked very far when a large shadow cast itself over them. It was probably a bad idea, but they looked up anyways.
After a few seconds, Maxwell said, "Are you seeing what I'm seeing?"
"Uh," Jordan replied.
Maxwell nodded sagely. "That's what I thought."
--------------------------------------------------------------
"Giant transdimensional teleporting geese," Right repeated in disbelief. "With laser eyes."
"Sounds delicious," Rong commented a little cheerily.
"Quite dangerous. Especially if we let them nest."
"You have to be kidding."
"I'm sure if you wait around, you'll see them soon enough. I'd rather leave you now, though. Is your almighty babysitter going to come pick you up anytime soon?" he asked impatiently.
"Oh, he teleports us to the next round when one of us dies," Rong replied casually. She grew a little uncomfortable in the following silence.
The supervisor stared at them. It was the stare of a businessman who had just found out how to deal with a pesky problem and didn't care how immoral the solution was. It was a very evil stare.
"Attention everyone," he said, and somehow his voice boomed throughout the gardens. "I have changed the policy concerning intruders. Kill on sight. Don't wait for the first strike. That is all." All the while, he flexed his claws in a very threatening manner, casual suit aside.
"Let's not make this last too long, hm?" he said, sounding the most cheerful they had heard him.
The Manikin was growing quite large now. It was hard for anything to hold it, as the sheer girth of it was just impossible to keep down. Though the plant man had continuously tried to tie it down, the Manikin easily gulped him down before devoring any lingering vines that clung desperately onto it. It was growing to be quite the monstrosity.
Many of the small gardeners were prodding at it with their sharp shears. Rong's scales were weak enough to be cut, but the wounds were annoying at best. Blood seemed rather tedious and unnecessary to the Manikin, but it seemed to come with the whole 'powerful dragon' schtick so it'd have to just deal with the whole thing it supposed. It dealt with the whole thing by whipping its tail around, knocking several gardeners over, allowing it to devour them as well. They didn't taste as good as the fruit. Inky. Bitter. Disappointing.
As more gardeners swarmed around it, still making brave and useless attempts to damage it in any serious way, the Manikin pondered what to do next.
It remembered its goal of enacting vengence upon the dragons. It realized that it had gotten too excited with the appearance of the tasty fruit around it. It should finish its work and then it could gorge itself even more. It shouldn't be too hard to kill the dragons now, to be honest. It had grown much and it was pretty sure they hadn't grown at all.
The Manikin experimentally flapped its wings which, although rather developed now, were still not big enough to be able to support its weight. Still, it found (after knocking down numerous trees and gardeners) that when it jumped around, the wings did help it glide further. With a satisfied roar, it jumped, bounded off the top of a tree (which also fell over), and glided away from the destroyed patch of land.
It would be nice if it could find those dragons quickly and get it over with. Still, it thought as it managed to grab a person off the ground and flip him into its mouth, it was in no hurry.
----------------------------------------------------------------
"Dammit! I hate that guy even more now! Let's go already, I need to vent! Maybe there's another stupid wizard going around that I can kill..."
"Mmhmm," Right replied vaguely, still glancing around. "I think I hear something."
"I mean making some sort of weird monstrosity wasn't good enough, he had to go tampering with its minds too?" Rong paused. "I think I just insulted myself."
"No, I'm being serious. Don't you hear it?"
"I don't hear anything," Rong said impatiently, though as she said it, she could hear what he was talking about. It was one of those sounds she usually filed as 'background noises' and then ignored. It was a persistant buzzing, bug-like in quality. Rong scowled at this. She was never a fan of bugs. (Really, who was?) If any of the pesky things came near her, she wouldn't hesitate to burn them down. (That isn't saying much, now is it?) Though usually the damn things buzzed around too fast for her to even aim right and fireballs were not well known for accuracy in the first place and it always seemed that just when she thought she got all of them, a whole freaking militant pops up out of nowhere and...
"Let's get going," Rong muttered, not in the mood to deal with annoying bugs.
"Let's," Right agreed and immediately started towards the buzzing. Rong pulled back.
"I meant away, not towards!"
"I'm curious about this noise, though," Right insisted, tugging harder towards the sound.
"What's so interesting about a bunch of bugs?" Rong shouted back. Eemp stumbled a little when Right stopped pulling to stare blankly at the blue dragon.
"...Why...why did you assume they were bugs...?" Rong managed to shuffle around uncomfortably despite having no feet to shuffle.
"I dunno, it sounds like bugs. Doesn't it sound like bugs?"
Right listened some more. "Not...bugs specifically...it's not as though insects have some sort of copyright on buzzing noises. It could be a machine. Or...somebody making a particularly irritating buzzing sound..."
"Somebody making a buzzing noise that sounds as though it's coming from a crowd...?"
"It could be a collection of machines," Right shot back defensively. "The point I'm just trying to make is that you can't--" But he couldn't finish stating his point for at that moment, the buzzing noise found them.
As Rong had thought, they were bugs. But they were the most horrifying bugs she had ever seen. If terror was in bug form, it would probably look like this.
Bugs half a foot long, collected in the largest swarm she had ever seen. She didn't even know bug swarms could get that large. Their jaw-mandible-claw things had barbs and their tail had barbs and their whole freaking body had barbs and she would not be surprised if there were barbs on their wings and god she hated bugs so much.
"...Maybe these pollinate the trees," Right commented. Rong responded by flaming the hell out of the disturbing suckers.
Some sluggish ones did indeed get incinerated, but the swarm was still ridiculously huge and maybe she was imagining things, but it was getting bigger and god she hated bugs so much.
Another large burst of flame did little to lower the numbers. "Pollinate?" Rong gasped out. "Those things look like they were built to eat your face off!"
"I see your point," Right conceeded.
Though fire wasn't killing a lot of them, it seemed to be discouraging them from doing anything, though when Eemp tried backing away, they still followed, apparently still intent on eating something even if it did spew fire, seemingly confident that they would somehow get around that pesky obstacle and goddammit she hated bugs so goddamn much.
"Insects are adverse to smoke, aren't they?" Right said, finally looking a little bit nervous. It was only a fraction of the nervousness he should have felt, but at least it was a start. "Maybe if you just keep smoking, they'll leave..."
"Smoke makes my throat itch," Rong whined
"Would you rather let them eat your face off?"
"Well, they won't eat my face off as long as I keep spitting fire at them!"
"And fire won't burn your throat?"
Rong paused to ward off the death bugs again. "NO!" she screeched with frustration. "It WON'T!"
And the two would have continued squabbling had another figure suddenly appeared, nonchalantly caught many of the swarming bugs, and ate them.
If the bugs were disconcerted about being prey rather than predator as they were used to, they didn't show it. As soon as the crunch of several unlucky insects sounded and the juice squirted down the newcomer's maw, the swarm angrily descended upon him. But it seemed that they weren't able to eat him. He just stood there calmly as they buzzed about them, every once in a while reaching out to eat some more.
After a few minutes of confused buzzing, the swarm decided that nothing here was worth the trouble and flew away. At least most of them did. Some lingered, still attracted to the smell of their own juices and were quickly eaten as well.
"It looks as though that fruit would be hard to juice," the stranger said calmly and now that he was not being obscured by clouds of super-bugs, Right could get a good look at him.
He was tall, tall enough to be vaguely threatening. But even if you weren't scared of tall people, you might be at least somewhat disconcerted by the large horns that curled over his head. Or maybe by the ridiculously long tail that twisted around and tapered before suddenly forming a sharp point. Or maybe the claws. Then again, he was wearing semi-formal clothing, which sort of off-set any threatening characteristics about him.
After a moment, Right managed out a "Really?" just as Rong settled for a more direct "Who the hell are you?"
The demon stared at them, lashing his tail contemplatively. "I suppose you can say...I'm the supervisor of this whole property you are tresspassing on," he said simply.
"You'd think the Organizer would watch over his own gardens," Right commented wryly.
"Oh, think much, do you?" the horned supervisor said in the most scathingly innocent way imaginable. Right was too busy being surprised to make a retort.
"I'll have you know," he continued, his tone getting hotter until it was almost scalding, "I am the organizer of this whole operation. I thought of it, I built it, I tended to it, I hired workers when it grew larger than I had originally thought and I don't appreciate tresspassers."
"No, wait, we didn't mean 'an organizer', it's the Organizer," Rong cut in, either not realizing or not caring that the supervisor wasn't in the mood for interjection.
"You know," Right added. "Capitalized."
The demonic supervizor glared coldly at them and slowly shook his head. "I will never understand how religious zealots keep managing to get in here. Well, since you somehow got into this pocket dimension, I'd appreciate it if you leave."
"Well, because of the aforementioned capitalized Organizer," Right replied almost as testily as the supervizer, "A few beings, including us, have been transported here unwillingly. Meaning that there are two other 'trespassers' and none of us can traverse dimensions. So we're stuck here."
The demon at least looked a little surprised at this, but he quickly returned to his sour countenance. "Ah."
"'Ah?' That's all you have to say?"
The supervisor shrugged. "We've had worse problems."
"Worse than a pyromaniac, a jumpy pyrokinetic and the wooden embodiment of gluttony?" Right demanded.
"Yes," he replied without much thought. "Ah, actually...yes." Right grunted, getting quite aggravated by this constant barrage of sardonic. "About every year."
"Oh really." Right tried his hardest to sound mordant. "And what sort of annual catastrophe does an isolated dimension of strange fruit trees undergo?"
---------------------------------------------
Jordan and Maxwell hadn't walked very far when a large shadow cast itself over them. It was probably a bad idea, but they looked up anyways.
After a few seconds, Maxwell said, "Are you seeing what I'm seeing?"
"Uh," Jordan replied.
Maxwell nodded sagely. "That's what I thought."
--------------------------------------------------------------
"Giant transdimensional teleporting geese," Right repeated in disbelief. "With laser eyes."
"Sounds delicious," Rong commented a little cheerily.
"Quite dangerous. Especially if we let them nest."
"You have to be kidding."
"I'm sure if you wait around, you'll see them soon enough. I'd rather leave you now, though. Is your almighty babysitter going to come pick you up anytime soon?" he asked impatiently.
"Oh, he teleports us to the next round when one of us dies," Rong replied casually. She grew a little uncomfortable in the following silence.
The supervisor stared at them. It was the stare of a businessman who had just found out how to deal with a pesky problem and didn't care how immoral the solution was. It was a very evil stare.
"Attention everyone," he said, and somehow his voice boomed throughout the gardens. "I have changed the policy concerning intruders. Kill on sight. Don't wait for the first strike. That is all." All the while, he flexed his claws in a very threatening manner, casual suit aside.
"Let's not make this last too long, hm?" he said, sounding the most cheerful they had heard him.