Khellendrosiic

OOC: Gotcha, Halo. Ceiling height is about twenty meters, although it looks much higher, thanks to a completely simulated sky. The entire arena is about the size of two football fields put together but I'm not sure how you'd apply that to number of blocks. You can interact with anything, the holograms are sort of like the ones in Star Trek. Example: You can pick up and a car, throw it, and the guy who gets hit will hurt like a real car was thrown at him. Also, there are no civilians running around and if you go into a house, it'll look as though they just got up to leave a few minutes ago. The guy who programmed all this for the Coliseum has an odd sense of humor.

"You're getting on my nerves!" yelled Scorpion as he blocked the fire blast with his cannon arm. Grabbing onto the ice encasing it with his right claw, he began tearing at the frozen stuff, trying to dislodge it from his cannon. While he was occupied doing this, his tail cannon, recently repaired, snapped up and shot a large bolt of energy at Charcold.

Mako took the blow and the grabbed Coldfire's arm. Twisting it painfully, Mako turned back to look Coldfire straight in the eye and grin horribly.

"You can't win, hero. I've killed dozens of men tougher than you."

That said, Mako brought up his leg and kicked Coldfire in the side of the head.

******************************************

After Rai came up on the elevator ((I assume you want in on the fight)), the glowing numbers began to count down. When they reached 00, a buzzer sounded and the numbers vanished. The fight was on.

OOC: Just so you know, you can't see the Arachnos yet and I'll tell you when you do. I've got plans, see?

The guard looked down at Podo and shrugged.

"I just sent up a rock dude and some guy with a sword. I think they could use whatever help they could get. Just hop on and I'll send you up."

**********************************************

The lower arena was once again configured as a city scape. Except instead of some ruined, war torn version of Paragon City, it appeared as a slightly barren looking Steel Canyon. The road behind Ryan and Goro shimmered slightly to show that it was the boundry of the arena and streets ran off to the left and right. Ahead was a very tall skyscraper. Also, a pair of large red numbers hung in the air before the two fighters. They read 10 and the guard had told them the fight would start when they reached zero. So far, the numbers were not counting down.

*****************************************

OOC: I'll get the patrons later in another post after I've gotten some sleep. Night!

OOC: Any NPC I bring in can be used by anybody that wants too. After all, that's what they're there for.

"You hit hard," conceeded Mako as he threw Charcold off him and rolled his neck to work out a crick. There was a massive bruise on his chest from Charcold's punch and the mutant seemed to favor that side a little bit but otherwise he was unharmed.

"But there is a reason why I am one of Recluse's lieutenants and why you're just another small fry!" Mako shouted as he tore off after Charcold and dealt him a long slash down one side. Charcold hit back with firey fist but Mako rolled with the punch and kicked Charcold between the legs.

"I am so pissed off right now!" shouted Black Scorpion as he came up behind Coldfire and smacked him. Coldfire managed to block the blow but he was blown back a few feet anyway. Scorpion then took one step back to brace himself and leveled his hand cannon at the hero.

"Die!" he roared as he fired.

*****************************************

"What the hell is taking them so long?" wondered the Bane Spider Executioner in charge of the Arachnos forces assigned to Mako and Black Scorpion. His question was directed to a Crab Spider Webmaster that was standing next to him with a very resigned look about him.

"Any number of things," answered Captain Farfield. "There could be a mechanical failure with the elevators or they might be having trouble getting enough people to sign up to fight us."

"Ah, yes. That must be the case. After all, you in their right minds would dare challenge the best soldiers that Arachnos has to offer," stated the Executioner confidently.

"Whatever you say, sir," sighed Farfield.

EDIT: Ignore this post. Blaster was right.

"Well that was fun," remarked Toy as he skidded to a halt out in front of Alpha Base. "Why don't you go check in on whats-his-bloodsucker, the intel chief. I'm pretty sure he's the one you'll want to deliver the goods to. As for me, I think I'm going to sit out here and take in the sun a bit."

Kicking off, Toy utilized the moon's lower gravity to jump up on top of the airlock and recline on the slightly inclined plane of the roof.

*********************************************

Inside the base, alarms began blaring the instant it was discovered that Flieschman's bio-signs went flat. The command room was instantly locked down, with a heavily armed rapid reaction force taking guards positions at the intersections leading to it. Other personnel scrambled to get into pre-designated safe points, such as the armory and several large common rooms. Zenith Mekmen deployed from wall niches all around the base and began patrolling the base, searching for any intruders. Given that the alarm that had been raised meant that someone had snuck into the base, each five Mekman patrol included a single Hoverbot varient loaded down with extra sensory gear instead of missile racks.

"Touchy, touchy," said Mako as he grabbed Charcold's hand with his own, and oblivious to the pain, held tight and began spinning and the villain around and around before throwing him at Black Scorpion. Scorpion, for his part, decided that Mako had the right idea and so instead of trying to dislodge Coldfire, he swept his arm up and hit the hurtling Charcold straight up into the air. Then the Inferno attack slammed into Scorpion's face and he flailed wildly about.

****************************************

"Just walk on down to the elevators," Carson said. "There'll be another pair of guards down there waiting for whoever wants to fight."

OOC: Is that it? Just Kaiser, Soviet, and Shadow?

The Guard Commander, Carson, lowered the blast plate of his Crey Power Tank suit and took a close look at Reikoff and his Malta.

"Heh, you guys. I can tell you a bit. It's mainly Wolf Spiders and Tarantulas, with a couple of the other types thrown in. Captain Farfield and his Crab Spiders were also forced to participate for the 'glory of their patron'. That's all I can tell you, so either go fight or bugger off."

Carson snapped the visor shut and patted the assault rifle he had slung at his side.

*************************************

"Whatever," snarled Mako as he grabbed Charcold by his thighs and threw him at the wall. Charcold slammed into the wall and Mako jumped to his feet. Shoving his hand at Charcold, Mako summoned up some of the ancient powers he had unlocked and fired a pack of spirit sharks as him.

"God damn it!" cursed Scorpion as his tail took the blow and went limp. But Coldfire was now visible and Scorpion spotted him quickly. Pivoting at the waist, Scorpion backhanded Coldfire and sent him flying into the wall. His fury aroused, Scorpion's intelligence won a momentary victory. Ignoring Coldfire for a moment, Scorpion leveled his hand cannon at Charcold and fired once to complement Mako's shark attack.

The guard paused and then shrugged.

"I don't know. I'd go ask Carson, my boss. He's over by the main desk right now," he said and then left to complete his rounds.

****************************************

"Damn it, fish-head!" bellowed Scorpion as he whipped his tail back and forth, Coldfire trailing from it like a flag flapping in a strong wind. The power armored brute scowled at Charcold as he kept thrashing his tail around and then suddenly grinned. That was the only warning Charcold had before Mako slammed into his side.

The villain fell to the ground and Mako pushed off and somersaulted through the air to land on his feet in a crouch.

"I mean it when I say I'm going to kill someone," Mako hissed at Charcold, not knowing that he was speaking to the wrong twin. Diving at the prone villain, Mako started clawing up a storm, reveling in his trademark bloodlust.

"Thanks for the help, guys!" Toy said to the stunned Longbow. "I caught this spy here and I'll take him back to base."

Turning to Spion, still encased in the detention field, Toy grabbed onto the shield and dragged it behind the hill he had hid behind earlier. Switching off the shield the moment they were out of view of the Longbow, Toy patted Spion on the shoulder and said, "Run."

Toy quickly followed his own advice, his bots loping along behind him.

OOC: Btw, the only patron I've fought so far has been Ghost Widow so I don't know Mako's and Scorpion's powers that well. But I have fought a copy of Scorpion and I think I can fake Mako's style well enough. And while Kaiser is busy with these two, I'll set up a match for everybody else.

BIC: "Distract this!" yelled Black Scorpion as he raised his left arm and fired a blast of energy at Charcold. Charcold dodged easily but he had a harder time avoiding a tail blast that fired almost immidiately afterward. Charcold managed to keep rushing and lunged at Scorpion but the wily patron had a trick in store.

Shifting himself to one side, Charcold just barely brushed by Scorpion and then was knocked sprawling behind the brute by a whack to his back from the tail.

"Too easy," said Scorpion scornfully as he charged up another hand blast.

*********************************************

"Let's see what you've got, little guppy," said Mako as he charged at Coldfire as well. The shark mutant took the ice sword in his shoulder but shrugged off the pain and grabbed Coldfire around the neck, preparing to bite him with his extremely powerful jaws and finish the fight quickly.

******************************************

A guard stuck his head into the spa and took a quick look at the several female figures that were in there.

"Anybody who's up for a fight, we've got some Arachnos down in the main arena that're bored and want to fight. There's a lot of em so I think we can fit in as many fighters as we want. If you want in, just come on down to the basement with all the elevators in it."

After saying all this, the guard left to go to other meeting places and said more-or-less the same message in the bar, the work-out room, and the repair bay.

With an almost inaudible sigh, the door in front of the two Cold's slid open, revealing the smaller arena that this had all started in. After stepping out onto the sands, the crowd started cheering and the door slid back shut.

"And we have a pair of returning fighters from yesterday, folks! The villainous Charcold teams up with his heroic twin, Coldfire! It looks like today is a good day for rivals forced to compete together! Give a big welcome for the second team, brought to you by the Master of Mayhem himself!"

The door opposite Charcold and Coldfire slid open and a massive, lumbering, metallic figure stepped out. Behind it was a much more lithe, agile looking creature with bloodlust burning in his eyes.

"Straight from the Rogue Isles and the armies of Lord Recluse himself, I bring you Black Scorpion and Captain Mako!"

The crowd roared even louder as Black Scorpion flexed his tail menacingly and Mako's claws twitched.

"You better hold up your end, you rusting bucket of bolts," Mako hissed as he crouched down to an attack position.

"And you better stay out of my way, you @#$%ing fish-face," Scorpion replied as power fed into his arm cannon, causing it to glow red.

"Let's get it on!"

OOC: Home team gets first move.

OOC: Wakey wakey, Soviet.

The guard by the door leading to the other deployment room looked up as Coldfire approached and then stepped forward to block his way.

"Sorry, man. We've already got the other two competitors lined up. You and your twin there are fighting together," the man said.

******************************************

Reikoff heard mocking laughter as his operatives found nothing to aim at.

"I could do many things, most of them quite unpleasant. But all I ask for you to avoid any of those fates is to keep your greedy hands to yourselves, at least in public areas such as these."

OOC: Sorry people, I've been a wee bit busy.

BIC: Reikoff felt a tap on his shoulder and he spun around...to see nothing but another Malta operative. Shrugging, Reikoff went back to scanning for supers and almost jumped when something poked him in the stomach.

"We don't look kindly upon you people here..." whispered a voice right in Reikoff's ear.

**********************************************

"Time for the first fight of the day, ladies and gentlemen!" shouted the announcer. "Just a quick two on two competition and the fighters should sign up and be ready to enter with a couple of minutes! hanks for chosing the Coliseum, folks! We're happy to have you here!"

"Oh yeah, I was hired to protect you. My bad," said Toy as he dropped a detention field on Spion. The machine gun rounds and magnum bullets rebounded and richocheted off the sheild as Toy concentrated and pulled it back out of the line of fire.

"Sorry, but I think you should let me handle this."

"With what?" Spion angrily asked, his voice muffled by the detention field.

"With us," said Combat Toy as it and the other bots stepped out from cover and launched a barrage of missiles. "Heads up!"

OOC: Sorry, I had prom. And I have a sleep hang-over, or something. So my brain hurts.

"I hate plants," muttered Toy Dispenser as he kicked away a chunk of dead Ent. The large tree thing had charged out of a stand of normal moon trees accompanied by a swarm of smaller bush things that Toy had designated Entlings. As it was, Toy was pretty close to Beta Base and he didn't want to call unwarrented attention to himself. If he was lucky, Longbow would think that it was just some of their operatives running across the hostile plant life, which wasn't that hard to imagine.

"Found a good hiding spot, boss!" called out Small Toy from up ahead. Toy had sent the battle drone out to scout since one little robot was much less conspicuous than a great stomping group of them.

Within a few minutes, Toy was lying on his back just a foot away from the top of a small hill with a good view of Beta Base. Extending up a small optical camera, Toy kept a close eye on the base.

The registrar looked back down at the paper and then gave a thumbs up to Reikoff and his crew.

OOC: You know, Essex is short. And you know what else? I have a lvl 20 or 22 blaster on Protector. Can't remember which.

"Duels are not allowed in the arena," spoke a deep voice from behind Podo. "Although they are possible if you fill out several reams of paperwork."

Turning, the goblin saw a tall, but somewhat hunched over old man clad in flowing green robes. The man's grey beard reached down to about shoulder level and it could be seen that he was bald otherwise, as his hood was pulled down at the moment. He looked like quite an ordinary, harmless old man if you just ignored the flaming green eyes, rune inscribed, crystal tipped staff, and the several odd pouches and talismans hanging from his belt. The old mage looked at Agent and a wry smile crossed his features.

"I am Andraxus. A high archmagus of the Circle of Thorns. A pleasure to meet the two of you and now, if you'll excuse me, I need to sign the sign-up sheet."

Podo and Agent unconsciously took a step back from the desk to allow Andraxus access to the paper. His grin widening, Andraxus produced a feathered quill from a pouch and scribbled several somethings on the paper. Slipping the quill back in his pouch, Andraxus nodded at the registrar and slowly walked away. The registrar picked up the paper and read the names out loud.

"Let's see here. Andraxus, Drak'thul the Denied, Sartherron the Ending, Sefrist, and Raxiguriax. Raxigruix. Raxa-something or other. Damn runes."

OOC: More RP! MOAR!!!!!!

"Eh, great," muttered the mastermind to himself as he walked through Alpha Base. "Now I've got to ask Backer if I have to listen to her. Nothing about taking orders from another officer is in my contract."

The guard at the Kommandant's quarters looked up as Toy neared and gave the mercenary a nod.

"Kommandant Backer requests your presense on the command deck," said the sentry. Still thinking to himself, Toy nodded absently and started following handy signs that pointed the way to C&C. Walking up to the automatic doors that were the only guards to the command and control room, Toy stepped through and took a brief look around.

The room was fairly large, apparently Alpha Base had originally been intended as a military base. Banks of computers and monitors lined the walls and about half of them were currently occupied. A huge holoprojected screen took up the entire left wall and there was an island facing it. A ramp starting near the right wall led up to the top of the raised section of the room and a large chair with several computers sitting next to it were all that occupied it. Of course, there was also Kommandant Backer sitting in the chair and a typically anemic looking vampyr standing with him, but they weren't a part of the room.

A pair of warwolves looked up when Toy entered and their hackles rose as they realized they didn't recognize him. A pair of 5th Column Mekmen also reacted to Toy's entrance, but they snapped to attention instead of opening fire, giving the warwolves the cue they needed to calm down and avoid a fight.

"Ah, Toy Dispenser!" said Backer from up in his chair. "Wait right there, I'll be down in a moment."

True to words, Backer got up from his chair and started walking down the ramp with the vampyr in tow. Hesitant, and a bit surprised at this warm greeting, Toy moved to meet the Kommandant at the bottom of the ramp. As he got within reaching distance, Backer clapped Toy on the shoulder with a wide smile on his face.

"A very good job, my mercenary ally! I didn't expect a single man to be alive when I sent you to Cave Io but not only did you escape that, you even brought back the patrol leader himself! Ah ha! Verdant has been a veritable wellspring of information about the goings-ons of the Moon Igneus in that area. Based on the information he aquired, we can set charges that will drop an entire tunnel complex on top of their gravel filled heads!"

Not sure how to react to this, Toy bowed a little.

"Then you should be congratulating Patrol Leader Verdant then, sir. I'm quite sure he could have made it out of there, with or without my help. He is quite a soldier."

"And with humility too," spoke up the vampyr suddenly. "I am Intelligence Officer Beckett. I requested your services from the Kommandant for a mission that needs doing."

Backer nodded at that and then turned to go back to his command chair.

"I shall leave you two to discuss the details. Be assured that Officer Beckett is of equal authority to myself in regards to the mission he is going to send you on. And the best of luck to you as well."

Beckett waited until Backer had walked away until he spoke again.

"There is another mercenary of ours. A super named Spion. Officer Fliechsman sent him to infiltrate the Beta Base not that long ago. I require you to get as close as you can to Beta Base and meet up with him. The information he is after is extremely valuable and must not be recaptured. When you exit the base, a soldier will give you a small capsule. When you see Spion, show this too him. He will know that you are in our employ at that time. Escort him here post-haste."

"Alright, I'll see what I can do. And if Spion manages to get himself caught while trying to get out, I'll see what I can do about breaking him out," Toy said.

"Very good," replied Beckett and then dismissed Toy before walking back up to Backer.

Shrugging, the mastermind left C&C and made his way back to the airlock.

OOC: There we go, another contact.

Toy caused several clicks and whirs go off in his body as though he was just rebooting. Waving off the woman's attempts at helping him up, he was far too heavy, even in the moon's reduced gravity, and pushed himself up to his feet. He staggered a bit and leaned against the wall. He looked down at Flieschman and slowly shook his head.

"I'm at least as surprised as you are. She must have been playing along the whole time, waiting for a chance to escape. Not your fault, doc, she must have been cleverly constructed," Toy straightened up and smoothed out some rumples in his cape. "I didn't expect to get hit low frequency sonic wave, though. I'll be damned if it wasn't the perfect wavelength to knock my gyroscope out of whack."

Sending a quick radio signal, Toy called off his bots and had them take up stations near the airlock. If Flieschman got suspicious, he'd need an exit and fast.

OOC: Eeeehhhhhhhhhhhh.............. Hoooooooommmmeeeewwwooooorrrrkkkk........ And test server where I just missed a petiton reply because I was posting elsewhere and I'm still trying to work this tournament thing and yes Coldfire reminds me of Iron Fist. Ok, time to whip something up here.

BIC: The registrar wordlessly pointed over to the wall where the misfortuned Sky Raiders had come through before. The wall had been repaired and repainted but the interesting thing was a poster that a man was putting up. It read:

[Brought to you by the one and only Coliseum, the

SECOND ANNUAL BEAT DOWN TOURNAMENT!!!!!!

Come and see the best and the brightest go up against the worst and the dumbest! Watch supers of all kinds fight each other solely for your viewing pleasure! See the brand new owner of the Coliseum in his first public scene handing out the grand prize to the winner! Come for all the thrills and chills of a real life war fought just for YOU with no consequences what-so-ever, for you of course!

All aspiring contenders should sign up by May 10 ((today, game time)) and be ready to fight by May 11 ((game time)) as well. The tournament will start at 12 noon on the 11th and continue until only one fighter is left.

COME FOR THE TIME OF YOUR LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!]

There were some disclaimers and legal stuff at the bottom of the poster along with a grand prize number that had more zeroes than most people see as one number in their entire lives. But printed in small letters underneath the prize money amount was the phrase, "Redeemable for one favor."

OOC: Knock yourselves out. I'll come back later with the first match of the day.

If Toy had had eyes, they would have widened in surprise. He had had a nice little escape plan for her partially worked out already and what did she do the instant he fixed her? Run off pel-mell into something that she probably wouldn't survive. Thinking quickly, Toy decided to take the "She wasn't actually brainwashed and your stupidity got me hurt" track, which started with...

As soon as Essex rocketed away from Toy, the mastermind collapsed in a heap as though he was a puppet whose strings had been cut all at once. His blue and red diamonded cape lay atop his unmoving form and Toy waited for Flieschman to start yelling at him for doing something.

Sometimes having morals really comprimises my job. Toy thought, That, and a have one hell of a weakness for women. And I don't even have any hormones to blame for stuff like this! Damn!