STATUS:
Starting new YouTube show, Hell Yeah Gaming! Lots of work to do still, but getting me to 100 subs for a custom URL would be of tremendous help! youtube.com/user/DarthGlamd…
6 yrs ago
Current
Starting new YouTube show, Hell Yeah Gaming! Lots of work to do still, but getting me to 100 subs for a custom URL would be of tremendous help! youtube.com/user/DarthGlamd…
Level 5 - (48/50) EXP (+2, -3 friend heart), Level 5 - (31/50) (+2), Level 3 - (9/30) (+2) Location: Land of Adventure - Coral Highlands, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count:775
”Tch,” the Courier spat, rapidly reloading his revolver. Looks like that kid took a real nasty hit. Well, maybe that was a good thing? Would be easier to convert him back to the side of having proper senses with a friend heart and all. Meanwhile the monster was lookin’ none too pleased with itself, full of broken bones and all. If the deathclaw parallels continued, that wouldn’t rightly matter to this fiend; it’d keep on attacking until they, or it, were dead. But maybe it wasn’t entirely like a deathclaw? Maybe in such an injured state they proved to be far more trouble than they were worth as a meal?
Fuck that. It made the mistake of attacking him when he was being nice.It was gonna die.
Ivories was stuck up on the coral, but honestly that wasn’t too much of a problem. The donphan howled in frustration at not being able to properly thrash its foe, but the Courier simply pointed its home pokeball at it, causing a little beam of light to return Ivories back, then immediately deployed it again. It was clear that the brave, powerful donphan was looking for an outlet for its aggression at having gotten stuck up on the coral, and this monster was still a convenient target.
”Show me what else y’can do, Ivories!” The Courier pointed dramatically at the tzitzi-ya-ku.
“Phan! Donphan!” Ivories glared at the enemy and stomped hard on the ground, creating a shockwave that rippled toward the injured monster! It was as though the power of its legs alone were that of a Bulldozer! Not satisfied with its ground attack alone, Ivories used its extra speed boost to curl back up into a rolling ball and shoot high up into the air! It came down hard, uncurling from its ball form and performed a mighty Slam with its trunk!
While Ivories dealt with the injured, now hopefully dead, monster, the Courier rushed over to the Cadet. Snapping his fingers, a large red heart appeared which he then unceremoniously, and without warning, slapped into the young man. ”Howdy, yer all better now, call me the Courier n’follow me if’n ya wanna save the multiverse. If not, I don’ rightly give a fuck what ya do.” He turned back toward the scene of the battle, hoping to catch the end of the tzitzi-ya-ku.
The damage they had done to the ent so far was intense. The monster was angrily thrashing about, clearly in desperation to finish off the heroes before they could do much more damage to it. Debris flew everywhere, the creature’s noxious poisonous goop shot out like a cannon! Jak was in the perfect position to unload more damage into the monster’s weak point, but unfortunately it focused on shooting directly at him with its nasty rot, and his light eco wings were too clunky to make dodging and weaving a proper tactic. The only way he could avoid it was to rely on gravity!
Jak ended his transformation, deploying his jet board and landing on it with expertise. Of course, he couldn’t use his gun while balancing on the board, and its shockwaves were too weak to really do any measurable damage to the ent’s sturdy exterior. Instead it was back to kickflipping off the hollows and rot warts, planting shockwaves in their faces, in order to keep the swarming masses away from the other fighters.
Meanwhile Ratchet took the opportunity to do some of the most dangerous and skilled platforming he had in his entire career as a galactic hero! As the ent’s tantrum tossed large stone chunks around, he took a running jump up, aided by Clank’s jetpack. He kicked off of a falling stone slab and pounced from another, then another, all the while Clank measuring the trajectories and assisting jumps with small jet thrusts. After kicking off of five stone chunks Ratchet performed a crouched high jump, shooting up even further with Clank’s final burst of jet fuel before being exhausted (and therefore demanifesting).
Ratchet flipped high above the ent, twisting upside down. This was it, his big moment! He pulled out not one, but two guns from his arsenal! In his left hand was the Reaper, while his right held the Bombbuilder! Both trigger fingers twitched and fired, a cluster of demonic energy from one and a powerful remote trigger bomb from the other, both careening straight down into the ent’s weak spot! ”Kaboom!” Ratchet called out, flipping back over to land on his feet on the inside of the cathedral.
Things were only getting crazier. Now the shadows were building up a resistance to light, or there were stronger shadows, one of the two. More were joining into the fray, the drunken Gaelic was cheering on for redheads, the Pumpkin King’s kids were getting wild, and now an abnormally intelligent horse was even jumping in to kick the monsters around. What a night this was!
”Are these the fabled Parisian nights I’m always hearing about?” Cassim asked Esmerelda, getting in close with his back to her, sword ready to defend them at a moment’s notice. A beast charged straight in but quickly found itself bisected. ”Looks like things are going to get worse before they get better! Everyone! Group up together! Around the children!”
Cassim rolled toward Lock, Shock, and Barrel, stabbing into another shadow beast as he went. If everyone followed his example, they would have a strong circle able to defend from every angle, with heavy artillery firing out from the center. Whatever was coming would surely be stronger than what they had faced so far.
”Nuts to that! I wanna li-i-i-aaaaah!” Iago found himself yanked by his tail feathers, forcibly dragged through the air by Cassim’s off-hand.
Level 5 - (49/50) EXP (+2), Level 5 - (29/50) (+2), Level 3 - (7/30) (+2) Location: Land of Adventure - Coral Highlands, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count:1033
Everything happened so fast, the Courier couldn’t see what all had happened in the exact moment. His shotgun shells had clearly done some damage to this dinosaur creature, but that didn’t seem to slow it down one bit. By the time he raised his head again, Bastion’s arm was on the ground and the robot was dissipating completely. The Courier’s eyes shot wide for a brief moment as he realized what had happened. Bastion would take some time before he could be deployed again, and in the meantime the threat of this monster was still looming, dangerous enough to cleanly cleave through solid metal. If it could do that, his own armored duster, not to mention his sub-dermal armor, wouldn’t be any better than paper. In an instant the Courier knew what this situation called for: he had to treat this creature just like a deathclaw, only smaller. And that meant it needed to be put down with as much firepower as possible, with extreme prejudice.
While the creature attacked the young man who had appeared and made a ruckus, the Courier dropped the pokeball containing his newest compadre, the donphan Ivories. ”Looks like ya got a chance t’show yer stuff, Ivories!” he said, pulling out what looked to be a normal bottle of water, but was in fact the chem Rushing Water. He downed half the bottle himself, then tossed the rest of the bottle into Ivories’ mouth. In an instant both could feel the invigorating properties of the water, increasing their attack speed by a very solid 50%! The Courier swapped to his magnum, not risking any more down time to reload his shotgun, and quickly fired 6 bullets into the monster as though the revolver were a semi-auto pistol! That on its own would have already been incredible attack speed, increasing his trigger finger by half, but he was a human.
Ivories curled up and began rolling at extreme speeds! The armadillo-elephant creature was already capable of rolling around at some absurd velocity, but increased by half? It used Rollout on the dinosaur! But would it be supereffective?
Things seemed to be going pretty well against the ent, all things considered! Sure, there were some hiccups, like the thing not catching on fire as they would have expected, but the minions it was summoning weren’t otherwise all that difficult to deal with and the slow, lumbering tree brute was easy enough to avoid. Ratchet even got a bullseye in that sweet, sweet weak spot! Clank’s rocket thrusters stayed on to let him slowly glide back down to terra firma, while he swapped weapons for the Coyote shotgun and cleared a landing zone from those little hollows. Meanwhile Jak was zipping around on his jet board, running over hollows and killing them off with the shockwave it was capable of generating. The things couldn’t even hope to touch him, while he made sure everyone had a better time hitting the ent without being accosted by such trivial minions.
Then everything changed when the ent let out a huge roar, and Nero was tossed aside like a rag doll. ”Uh oh,” Ratchet said, seeing the big globs of nastiness spraying everywhere. The nimble, acrobatic lombax jumped and dodged and blackflipped away, thankfully safe from getting struck. Jak was likewise able to avoid his own projectile with a well timed kickflip. But that severely changed the battle arena, the environment was going to be more difficult to traverse now. On top of that, more enemies, these ones of a completely different type, were now spawning!
”Great, more small fries.”
”Lock and load, Jak!”
”Don’t worry, I’ve got this one!” Ratchet fired off his shotgun at one of the rot warts coming right for him, blowing it to smithereens! Aaaand also releasing its toxic miasma right into his face. Ratchet immediately dropped to the ground, coughing and wheezing, his normally untouchably agile self unable to hardly move.
”Ratchet! I’ll save you, fuzzball!” Jak altered course on his jet board, but was too late. The ent prepared another shockwave and he had to ride it out on his board to avoid getting tossed to the ground. He pulled the stunt off expertly, but Ratchet couldn’t move. The hero of Veldin was sent flying, his fragile body breaking several bones in the process. Jak frowned, anger rising. His eyes turned black, his teeth became fangs, but only for a second. He hadn’t recharged his dark eco yet, and not even this rage was enough to trigger his Dark Jak transformation. Instead he calmed his mine to call upon another power.
Jak’s jet board shrank down and attached to his back as a Heavenly light transformed him into Light Jak, ethereal membraneous wings sprouting from his back. Jak took flight up high, morph gun still in hand in its yellow eco Blaster formation. From his new vantage point, Jak unloaded shot after shot of yellow eco into the ent’s weak spot.
Meanwhile, Ratchet was clinging onto dear life. His tenacity meant that no matter what injuries he suffered he could always move around at full power. Unfortunately that tenacity didn’t account for a body paralyzing goopy infection, just injury. But that didn’t mean he was going to go out like a pansy! A true hero would go down swinging, no matter what! One of the hollows approached, ready to finish him off. Ratchet coughed, moving the Coyote into place, and summoned the power to pull the trigger. BLAM! The hollow was blasted away, its life ended, but something else truly remarkable happened.
SECOND WIND
These words flashed across Ratchet’s visor, confusing him for a brief moment, when he felt all his strength returning. His wounds closed up, his bones knit back together, the toxic poison was expelled from his body. For all intents and purposes Ratchet was back on his feet as though nothing had ever happened! ”Wow. Heh. No wonder you kept calling yourself a badass, Zer0.” Ratchet pumped the shotgun, then charged back into the fray!
Level 5 - (47/50) EXP (+2), Level 5 - (27/50) (+2), Level 3 - (5/30) (+2) Location: Land of Adventure - Coral Highlands, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count:1129
Jak new power: You do well to rid the world of this metal scourge. As a reward, I grant you a dark power. - In Dark Jak form, Jak is able to manipulate dark eco in the form of energy attacks which come in two flavors. Small hand blasts that are relatively slow moving, but plow through obstacles with great force capable of toppling huge walls (which use a moderate chunk of his dark eco), and the Dark Bomb which releases all his currently absorbed eco in a single blast around him, completely destroying any but the most durable of enemies… But of course, dark eco cannot recognize friendlies and will harm all life indiscriminately.
The situation wasn’t looking too good, if the Courier were to admit it. The dinosaur monster wasn’t so receptive of him as most critters were. He thought that maybe if it weren’t for the offering of meat, the thing would have already been at his neck. Even so it was clearly a highly aggressive monster, looking for any reason to strike. His hand gripped his shotgun in its holster, ready to pull it out and fire the moment this creature moved, as it would undoubtedly come down to a fight. No befriending this hombre.
“I’d cover my eyes if I were you!” shouted a voice from afar, startling both the Courier and the monster he was attempting to tame. The dinosaur used some bizarre quirk of its biology to focus a blast of concentrated sunlight right at his eyes, but luckily the Courier was an adaptable fellow. Rather than be put off balance by the sudden warning of this stranger, it gave him the ample preparation he needed to do exactly that.
Time seemingly froze to a standstill as the Courier activated V.A.T.S., allowing him to observe the dinosaur creature in an extremely slow motion and pickout the best strategy. Its head seemed to be unfurling some sort of reflective membrane. In the slow motion he could already see how it was gathering light for what he presumed would be some sort of blinding tactic. Amazing quirk of biology this thing had, and very deadly when paired with those talons. Luckily, technology was on his side, as was luck. He had enough time to queue up 2 shots with his shotgun on the critter. Target head: Probability to hit - 95%
BOOM BOOM!
Two shots quickly blasted from the shotgun, depleting all its loaded shells and rendering the weapon useless until it could be reloaded. V.A.T.S. deactivated in the same instant as the creature came flying at him with razor sharp claws exposed, and he rolled off to the side. In his place manifested the large robotic striker Bastion in humanoid form, steel body ready to receive the damage and gun ready to unload into the monster.
Jak emerged from the van with Daxter on his shoulder, the two firing finger guns at one another playfully. Ratchet had since put away his new shotgun and was conversing with the others on minor small talk, nothing important, when Nero decided that enough preparations had been made and it was time to go kick some ass.
”Hold up,” Jak interrupted before they all head out, clearly bothered by something. When he spoke, it was uncomfortable and he avoided eye contact. ”I owe everyone an apology. I’m used to running in guns blazing and taking everything out without a problem, but that doesn’t seem to always work here. What I’m saying is, I guess if I’m the best there is on my world, I shouldn’t underestimate the dangers posed by the best of everyone else’s worlds too. So I got hurt when I had other ways to kill those things without the same risk and… Sorry that I made myself dead weight.” He met the other’s eyes for the first time, glaring in both determination, and anger. ”Nobody is going to have to come to my rescue again.”
Ratchet had to chuckle. ”Is that actually some humility from you, Jak? I’m surprised! Hahaha! I guess you’re forfeiting the contest to me, then?”
Ratchet and Jak clapped hands together, squeezing in a firm grip. ”Not on your life, furball.”
”Don’t underestimate us just because Jak had to get a bit sappy for a minute! I’m still the same hard as steel bad boy I’ve always been, capiche?” Daxter added.
”Sure, Dax.” Ratchet released his grip from Jak, who did the same, and the two heroes followed Nero through the cathedral plaza.
Up the stairs and out to the opening, a large creature stood silent and lonely amidst the gothic background. The ent looked to be a fearsome foe indeed, though also a passive one. It did not seem to recognize their presence, allowing them all to get setup however the group decided was best. Recognizing the enemy as being made of wood, Ratchet pulled out the bombbuilder as his main weapon for the battle, hoping the heat from the blasts might set the thing on fire. Jak pulled out his trusty morph gun and set it to the Vulcan Fury.
Then Nero called the monster out, and the battle had begun. Ratchet quickly took aim and fired two proximity mines at the ent’s feet, where they immediately exploded a safe distance beneath Nero as the demon hunter pulled off his own combo. Jak began to unload with rapid fire the high speed, high penetration rounds of his Vulcan Fury, sending more than 40 rounds of blue eco into the ent in just a couple of seconds. That was, until…
Click
Out of blue eco? Gah! Jak swapped the morph gun over to the Blaster mode and rolled away from a small group of hollows that sought him out. His roll jumps propelled him several meters at a time, allowing him to build distance, then take them out before they even got close. Once the hollows chasing him were blasted to smithereens, he turned back to the ent.
Meanwhile Ratchet had swapped out the bombbuilder for his trusty old omniwrench, standing at attention as the hollows began to swarm around him. He gave a couple warning swings to keep them off, but the creatures were not so easily dissuaded. They all jumped into Ratchet at once and… Moved right through him?
”I love this power! Zer0 had style!” Ratchet decloaked right behind the ent, Reaper in hand. He unleashed a shot of Hell energy directly into its back at point blank, all 6 shots concentrated together to hit the enemy.
In response to this, or perhaps to Nero, the ent slammed its arms down to create a shockwave in every direction, the whole plaza rattling with the force! Jak, being a good distance away, was able to spot the telegraphed move and hop onto his jet board and ride the wave out no problem. But Ratchet being so close and relatively easy to harm…
“I’ve got you, Ratchet!” Clank reaffirmed, appearing on the lombax’s back and taking on jet form. The little robot propelled Ratchet high up in the air to avoid the shockwave.
”Thanks, little buddy!” Ratchet said back, now taking another shot with the Reaper, down toward the ent’s head.
Level 5 - (45/50) EXP (+2), Level 5 - (12/50) (+2), Level 2 - (10/20) (+2) Location: Land of Adventure - Coral Highlands, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count:1089
The Courier looked over his small gains from those bullet creatures as he hopped back up onto his chocobo mount. A small gun, significantly lower caliber than his regular pistol, some strange half-hearts, and bullet casings of various colors. He could definitely use the casings to make some new ammunition. Maybe the casings were magical and the colors represented different effects? It was difficult to tell in this mishmash world what was used for what purpose, but he supposed it didn’t matter much. He’d find out by doing, but that was for the future. For the present he spurred Drumstick onward into the corral.
Immediately life all around him made itself known, strange and alien creatures that were utterly fascinating. Flying jellyfish and huge bugs lazily drifted around the air, apparently unafraid of his presence (not that many animals were ever afraid of him even when anybody else would drive them to hostility). Crustaceans, birds, and all manner of other creatures made these corrals their homes. This sort of beauty, it wasn’t anything he was used to seeing. Still, he had to focus on finding the wigglers, but a little souvenir wouldn’t hurt right? The Courier broke off a sizable chunk of choral, something to experiment with. Surely it’d have some chemical properties that’d make a nice chem.
A few minutes later and drumstick took them to a dip in the choral hills. There, at the bottom with some standing water, were little creatures that matched the description given by the quest card… But not the description given by Bowser. ”Can’t blame the big oaf I ‘spose. Lotta worlds mashed together, makes sense some have shared words.” Maybe he’d find the wigglers Bowser spoke of another time? He loved seeing new things after all, and-Oh my. Speaking of new things…
The wigglers were proven to be frightened of something. Not the Courier himself, but something else. An utterly amazing monster, something that looked like it stepped right out of the old pre-war history books: a dinosaur. 6 had to admit he didn’t know too much about dinosaurs (they weren’t a relevant topic even among academics in the wasteland) but it didn’t match any he knew about. Oh well. He hopped off Drumstick and pat the bird to reassure it, to keep it calm, then slowly approached the reptilian creature.
”Howdy,” he said, keeping one hand out as a gesture of good will while keeping his other hand at his holster just in case this animal wasn’t as friendly as the others. He was a magnet for goodwill from non-sapient animals, but it didn’t work on the monstrous, the especially mutated, or even some of the most vicious of even normal creatures. He had to be careful. ”You hungry feller? I got some meat saved from a castle feast none too long ago if’n you want some.” He held out a bit of turkey from his sack, offering to the Tzitzi-ya-ku.
Unable to help with the large suffering remaining, at least not without risk of explosions causing some friendly fire, Ratchet took to hopping and flipping around the battlefield, braining zombies left and right with his omniwrench. Now that the van had been pulled up safely he knew he could move away from Nero to join the battle proper. Smack, thwap, bam! Brains splattered to and fro while none of the creatures were able to keep pace with the fast and agile lombax.
Clank zoomed in on Jak’s unconscious body and snagged him up, pushing the long-eared human out of the danger zone. A couple seconds later and the giant shockwave made from a giant Gene would have left Jak in an even worse state. Once he was pushed out a few meters though, Clank could no longer move him. The rocket thrusters on the little robot were only good for small bursts, and he wasn’t strong enough to lift a fully grown man by himself. His temporary use expended, Clank vanished, his spirit returning to Ratchet.
”AAAAAAAAAAH!” Daxter ran screaming between the gravestones to escape his undead predators, inadvertently running toward the second suffering demon after Nero had unleashed his wrath upon it! The little ottsel climbed up its back like a big dirt mound, realizing his mistake only after reaching the summit. ”Oh dear…” Donnie’s kick brought the monster’s life to an end, something Daxter himself was turned away form and thus did not see. That’s because he was too preoccupied with the large van heading straight for him!
Nico’s van rammed right into the suffering’s limp body, and with that Daxter hit the windshield like a bug, limbs outstretched and tongue hanging out comically. Once Nico slammed the brakes, Daxter went flying once again, bouncing off the ground like a stone skipping across the water. ”Ow! Oof! Gah! Uh! Yeowchies!” Once he came to a stop, Daxter stood up and shook himself off, brushing the dirt and grime from his pants. ”One of these days, I tell ya!” he shook a tiny fist at Nico, not that she’d be able to see beneath the dash thanks to his small height.
With the main threats taken down and the zombies reanimated by the suffering no longer following the tactics of their masters, Ratchet chuckled. ”These guys are just way too easy!” He kept the slow shamblers off the group’s back while Donnie made pleasantries with the lightning hurling skeleton and everyone else got on board the van again. He was about to hop back into his kart when realization kicked in: Jak destroyed it! And Jak was still unconscious on the ground! Grumbling, Ratchet hopped on over and grabbed his friendly rival and hauled him up by the shoulder. ”Alright, come on, let’s get going.”
”Yeah, hurry up!” We ain’t got all eternal-dark-and-spooky-night to wait on you!” Daxter called out from just inside the van.
Ratchet shook his head but hurried all the same. ”Hey Blazer, you might want to focus on Jak here. He really let loose with that dark eco attack.” Once he got them both safely aboard the van, Ratchet accepted Donnie’s offer of a suffering spirit and crushed in in hopes of another gun. A big gun. He needed a lot more firepower to rebuild his arsenal.
Level 5 - (43/50) EXP (+3), Level 5 - (10/50) (+3), Level 2 - (8/20) (+3) Location: Land of Adventure - Coral Highlands, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count:2824
The journey to where these wigglers were hanging around wasn’t too long, especially considering his new stead, and allowed the Courier to survey the land quite a bit. With the map on his pip-boy updating automatically with the landscape around him, it was only a matter of time before he had a much more accurate and impressive lay of the land than that rudimentary, not-to-scale paper drawing they had found in the castle. Maybe he could sell copies of it to the guild or other locals as he continually updated it?
Thoughts of an easy buck aside, he had to marvel at the wondrous landscaping around him. Rolling hills were one thing to a man used to a flat desert, but hills made of coral? No sight had ever compared before, not even the beautiful canyons and trees of Zion Park, where he had met Joshua Graham. Coral, he wasn’t sure what it was at first. Instinct told him it was some manner of alien land, but the more he looked it over the more he recognized it was very much an earthborn phenomena. He had been to the oceans of California, swam in the waters and seen coral, but very little of it remained after the Great War. It took a few minutes to click what it all was around him, but once he understood plenty of options raced through his mind. He would take some samples of the coral to place in his pack, no doubt he’d be able to craft some nice chems with it, as well as grabbing some fungus and moss along the way. Once he got past the lowlands, that was.
His stead seemed a bit hesitant to cross through, wary of something. ”What’s the matter, Drumstick?” he asked, assigning the chocobo a name. It shook its head, feathers a bit ruffled, but continued to march forward at his insistence. He knew to keep a lookout, what with this animal’s instincts recognizing danger. He just didn’t expect that danger to take the form of giant living bullets with guns of their own, merrily taking potshots and just about everything in sight!
The first sign of these bizarre creatures came from the gunshots. Soon as he heard that, the Courier was put on high alert. ”What in the hell?” he mumbled, stopping his chocobo in its tracks. ”I’ve tangled with aliens, mutants, ghouls, magic, ghosts, an’ all manner o’crazy shit, but I never thought I’d see the day a bullet pulled the trigger itself.”
Some of the bullet creatures caught sight of him, and that meant going on the defensive. With their big handguns they fired, but thankfully the distance meant their sidearms couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. The Courier dove off Drumstick and urged it behind a big rock, where it dutifully followed.
Scoping out the situation, he had to make some choices. ”I could probably take a bunch of hits if’n I just charged in, but could get overwhelmed. At this distance my revolver and shotgun won’t hit shit, and that machine gun I got from Gaige chews through ammo so fast I’m already close to bein’ out. Luckily…” 6 pulled out his Ratslayer rifle and the spare box of rifle ammo from that loot box Peach had demonstrated earlier that day, more than enough to take out all the targets pinning him down and still keep going. He brought up his rifle, aimed down the scope, and fired.
BLAM!
The first of the bullet creatures died without any fanfare, and its companions didn’t stop to mourn. It was as though these creatures were utterly obsessed with just blasting away anything and everything they could with those big goofy smiles, like taking lives was a fun pass time. He didn’t much care for that. Blam! Blam! Two more down, the second scoring a critical hit.
With the threat neutralized, at least for now, 6 stood up from his cover position and signalled for Drumstick to follow. He moved slowly and methodically rather than riding his oversized bird, so as to not be a larger target and attract the attention of more bullet creatures. A few dozen meters through the foothills and something new caught his watchful gaze, just before the coral hills. A wild Pokemon! At least that’s what he assumed it to be. It had the same “feel” to it as the other Pokemon he had come across so far. It was surrounded by bullets, pelting it with constant barrage of… Well, little bullets. Gah, these creatures made keeping a straight line of thought impossible!
This absolutely couldn’t stand! Still keeping the element of surprise, 6 deployed his eradishield generator, not for himself, but in order to keep Drumstick safe from any stray gunfire. He had no intentions of staying out of the fray. ”YEE-FUCKING-HAW!” he cried out, charging forward with his shotgun in hand, pokeball in the other.
”Heracross! Throw me up!” he yelled, throwing the ball a little ways ahead of himself. Heracross, having had time to rest and recover from its earlier fight, popped out raring and ready to go! The Courier jumped up on the back of the giant bug’s shell, who launched him high into the air with its horn! BANG! BANG! Two shots went off from the shotgun taking out two bullets.
”Let’s go, Bastion!” he cried, still in freefall. The robot striker manifested around the Courier, allowing him to ride atop its shoulder. It landed on the ground with a heavy, shaking THUD, gun in hand. Bastion recognized the threat against a beautiful creature of nature and unloaded its firepower into the bullets, spraying around in an arc. Many fell, but others were nimbled and dodged around, taking their own potshots.
Most of the bullets failed to do any real damage to Bastion, while a couple hit the Courier. He winced in pain, getting shot was never pleasant, but he was used to it and his sub-dermal armor protected him from most of the injuries. The donphan was clearly surprised at the sudden arrival, but it didn’t attack or lash out at the robot or man now standing directly in front of it, recognizing the Courier as a friend and ally. Instead the donphan narrowed its eyes on the nearest bullet, curled up into a ball, and began spinning like a revving motor. Faster and faster, but not moving anywhere. Then suddenly, as though someone had just taken off the brakes, the donphan rolled out, trampling the bullet into the ground.
The fight was far from over, and many of the bullets remained. Happily, insanely dodging around and shooting, a stray bullet hit the Courier in his neck, where the armor was weakest. ”Gah!” he gasped, clenching the wound. Careless, he had been too careless. That little bastard had done pissed him off and that was the last mistake he’d ever make. Responding to his mental commands, Bastion threw the Courier at the offending bullet. Just before colliding, the Courier swung his Equalizer pickaxe with all the force he could muster, piercing the creature through and planting it firmly in the ground to die.
Another bullet hopped up right in front of the Courier’s face, absurd happy grin that it had, and planted its gun right up against his forehead. In that instant the Courier flashed back to that night Benny had kidnapped him, shot him in the head twice and buried him in a shallow grave. Could he survive a third bullet to the head? As fate would have it, he wouldn’t need to find out. Heracross came from nowhere and swung its arm at the bullet like it was doing some sort of karate move, like it was trying to do some sort of Brick Break. The bullet died in an instant, chopped in half by the large beetle protecting its trainer.
”Good on ya, Heracross!” 6 commented, tilting his hat up. ”I should give ya a name, shouldn’t I? How about Bugfoot?” Bugfoot danced happily, apparently ecstatic at the new name.
Courier 6 took a glance around to measure the state of the battle, only to find there was no more battle. The bullets were all dead, each and every one. The donphan and Bastion were busy cleaning up the rest while he was congratulating Bugfoot. Even Drumstick recognized the danger had passed and come out from the cover of the eradishield. ”Good work, y’all,” he assured. Bastion vanished, becoming a spirit once more.
6 approached the donphan, holding out a stimpack. ”I reckon ya could use some healin’, an’ so could I. We’re not hurt too badly, so this one should be able to cover us both. What do ya say?” The donphan nodded in acceptance, though it seemed to be rather disappointed at having to take his generosity. The creature seemed to be a very proud one, very self-reliant. Still, it was nothing but relieved as its wounds closed up with the use of the stimpack.
With both of them healed up, the Courier pulled out his second, and last, pokeball. ”Yer a pretty tenacious one, ain’t ya? Remind me a bit o’myself. Want to join my posse?” The donphan looked from the pokeball to the heracross and narrowed its eyes on the giant bug. It let out a grumbling roar and lifted its trunk up, as if to challenge Bugfoot. The normally happy and eager heracross recognized the challenge and pounded its fists together, then took what could only be described as some sort of fighting stance. ”Oh, so y’all wanna fight each other, do ya?” Both Pokemon gave what sounded like a positive response. ”Well I wouldn’t mind lettin’ y’all have a brawl together here’n there, so long as we got the time and place, but this ain’t neither right now.”
Both Pokemon looked back to the Courier, then to one another, holding their gaze for another moment until, ultimately, they relaxed themselves. The Courier casually tossed his pokeball at the donphan, who didn’t struggle or fight against it one bit. He officially had his second Pokemon partner. ”I’ll name ya Ivories.”
He then looked all around at the fading spirits of the bullet creatures, placing the pokeball on his belt. ”Awright, time to get crushing these spirits.”
”Don’t worry, I can keep them off your back!” Ratchet called out, determined to prevent any of the zombies from interrupting Nero and the others’ efforts in rescuing the van. With the bombuilder’s limited ammo regeneration he decided it would be better to, for the moment, switch to another weapon. He pulled out the handcannon. ”Ew, this thing is gross,” he commented, feeling the warm fleshy weapon in his hands. He took aim at the nearest undead shambling its way over and pulled the trigger. Less of a machine setting off and more of a biological retching, it fired out a long shard of some sort of bone which pierced through the zombie. ”Bingo bongo, and that’s one out!”
But of course, more were coming. Quickly he stuck another tooth-like shard into the gun and fired. Then again, and again. They pierced with remarkable power, sticking through multiple zombies and upping his death toll. ”We’ll catch up to Jak in no time!” he happily exclaimed. Only, uh oh, he ran out of shards to fire off. Well something like that never took Ratchet out of a fight! He pulled out the small pistol and removed its clip, tossing the handgun back into the hammerspace from whence it came, then loaded the bullets into his handcannon. No doubt this biological gun had far more firepower than that tiny pissant gun anyway.
Blam! Blam! Blam! Bullets fired out, casing and all, striking the zombies as they approached. Just as he expected, they were fired off with more power than the little sidearm they were originally made for. Unfortunately zombies were swarming in on his position in greater numbers than he could take down with this weapon. That was, until Gene insulted them which somehow attracted the attention of most of the swarm. ”Huh. Guess he’s so annoying that even the brainless don’t like him.” Ratchet shrugged and swapped back to the bombuilder. So long as they were all converging on Gene, they’d tear him to shreds the second his invincibility ran out. Two proximity bombs were fired into the amassing group, blasting them to smithereens by the dozens! But that only left enough charge in the bombuilder for 1 more proximity bomb. Not even enough for a remote detonator.
Dark Jak crashed into a tombstone and stopped moving, leaving deep cracks in the rock. A four armed uppercut from the suffering would have, and should have, killed him if it weren’t for Mar’s armor, but that didn’t mean he was feeling great. Hell, if it were his regular form and not Dark Jak that took the blow, the armor wouldn’t have been enough to save his life. Bottom line, he was lucky to have both on his side at the moment of impact, but bones were definitely broken. Dark eco leaked from cuts and open wounds, arcing out his body, utterly destroying the nearby plantlife. Jak was breathing heavily as Daxter sat on his shoulder, watching in silent open-mouthed terror as two skeletons conversed nearby.
Daxter couldn’t hear what the bone heads were talking about, they weren’t close enough for that, but skeletons too? Oh great. Wait, what was going on? One of them was charging in? ”Watch out! There’s a skeleton coming to-”
“Here to help!” Lightning blasted a zombie, then another and another.
”Nevermind!” Daxter shook his head in disbelief. What a day, am I right? ”Alright Jak, we’ve gotta get you back in the fight! Now… How exactly are we gonna do that?” Daxter tapped his chin, looking over his injured best friend. Still in Dark form, Jak wasn’t much for conversation or ideas, but clearly he was too injured to get up and charge back into the fray. ”I got it!”
Daxter crawled behind Jak to where the jet board was holstered on his back and activated it. The advanced machine expanded outward, hovering above the ground, now with Jak sitting atop it. The little ottsel grabbed the base of the board and adjusted it, aiming just right until it was facing the horde of zombies and, more importantly, the suffering. Then Daxter slammed his palm on the “turbo” button, sending the jet board flying across the graveyard like a racecar!
”Have a nice trip, Jak!” he called out, waving. Whew, that was a lot of work. But now nobody could say he didn’t help out, right? And he got to stay out of trouble too! Beaming with self-assuredness, Daxter almost missed the saliva dripping onto his shoulder from behind. ”What, now it’s raining? Who said it could rain toda-YAAAAAH! Wait for me, Jak!” Daxter barely dodged out of the grasp of a zombie, running away with both arms above his head.
Meanwhile, the jet board did its job of zooming Jak straight into the fray. Injured and unable to run around, Jak could still move his arms without a problem. He steered the jet board up into the crowd, bouncing off a zombie’s back, then threw himself off it in middair right above the suffering he had tangoed with a moment ago! ”I SAID DIE!” Dark Jak landed atop the beast, which reacted to his presence with a roar and a buck, but Jak wouldn’t be so easily tossed off. Already he sank his dark eco claws into the suffering. With his other hand he tore at the demon’s flesh, ripping out large chunks and tossing them aside, dark eco flooding the wounds with every slash of claw. After only a few seconds Jak pierced into the suffering’s brain and the demon let out its final death throes. It collapsed in a heap as Jak rolled off the side, his body shrinking, his skin returning to normal color.
Jak was left surrounded by enemies utterly exhausted, devoid of his dark eco powerup, his partner scrambling around in fear.
”Uh-oh. Clank!”
“Right away, Ratchet!” Clank manifested with his jet boosters and took off to help out Jak. Small and weak he may be, his metal body would at least keep him safe from the zombies.
-1 stimpack -1 pokeball + Proud and chivalrous warrior donphan + whatever comes from multiple bullet spirits
Level 5 - (40/50) EXP (+3), Level 5 - (7/50) (+3), Level 2 - (5/20) (+3) Location: Land of Adventure - Outside Lumbridge, Redgraccoon City - Charnal Lane Word Count: 2771
Unusually for the Courier, he was worryingly silent for a pretty long stretch of time. Leaving the guild hall accompanied by Bowser and Linkle, they met up with a strange new man who looked like he came right out of an old Groknak the Barbarian comic book, with fantasy style armor, medieval weaponry, and strange eyes suggesting he wasn’t quite human. He had a gruff, grizzled appearance to him that matched the Courier’s own, and the mailman felt something of a kindred nature to this “witcher,” if not in ability then in theme. He could feel this Geralt (as he introduced himself) felt the same way. Maybe there was some sort of psychic connection between those who died and came back from the brink? An unknown connection? Bah, these weren’t the sort of thoughts he normally cared for.
The koopa king’s wizard rejoined them as well, saying he had visited the Master of Masters, which instantly caused the Courier’s blood to boil. The red in his face would be visible to anybody who even half paid him any attention (ironic for a professional gambler to have such a terrible poker face!). According to Kamek, the MoM had no relationship whatsoever with the local guildmaster, and their similar wardrobe choice had more to do with a primordial force of evil magic in their world than any particular group. Naturally the Courier found this claim to be highly suspicious, but he couldn’t write it off as lies so quickly. After all, the best liars knew when to include the truth to bolster their lies. Damn, if only he knew magic himself, then he might be able to figure out what the MoM was up to, or force him to tell the truth. Maybe he could learn magic. Either by being taught, or through a much faster way… With a spirit.
The Courier’s thoughts were forced back to the present as Din rejoined them alongside another dancer, who claimed to also be a fortune teller. This woman offered to tell all their fortunes, something that Linkle was all too happy to lap up. What the hell? The Courier wasn’t one to deny any free service, and who knows? The Forecaster back home was always right, and he was just a little kid. A psychic little kid that amplified his natural gift with a helmet sure enough, but a little kid all the same. Who knew what sort of results could come from a magical fortune teller who had more years to hone her craft?
The Courier watched the shadows move and listened to their master speak, interpreting the events. First a tall figure with long sleeves running in fear, then enveloped in fire. The fortune teller said that they would soon “understand the task” implying they didn’t fully grasp their current reality, which 6 thought was fair. But which task? Killing Galeem’s cronies to get to the ball of light itself? The quests this guild gave them all? Something they hadn’t even run into yet? The next vision was a bit more explicit, with what appeared to be Linkle and another long-eared individual, coupled with the narration that there would be a betrayal, but one that would be beneficial to them all. Curious. Could his own plotting against the Master be seen as a betrayal to the group? But what role would Linkle and this other individual play into that if true? Kamek reported that, according to the Master of Masters, his group wore animal masks. If that was a kernal of truth, then perhaps… The scene faded as both were attacked by large blades, only to be replaced by a separate scene of Bowser and Kamek, utterly unmistakable, with some statements about discovery and choosing sides (perhaps the betrayal earlier would fracture the group?). A smaller figure appeared to be absorbing a spirit, becoming, as the fortune teller said, “what was meant to be.” Fuck that, nothing is meant to be. Choice was the only thing that mattered. Finally the last image, a man and woman with swords, apparently about to battle? But they did not want to, according to the teller’s interpretation.
Apparently the adventure would be full of incredible revelations as they carried onward. Not unexpected, really. This was a hodgepodge of dozens, if not hundreds or thousands of worlds. There was absolutely no way they could have a full understanding of what was going on so early on in the game. Especially not when much of that exposition was given to them by him. Best to place down their bets and spin the wheel. After that, whatever happens, happens.
After that the fortune teller excused herself, leaving the group to mull over what they had just witnessed. The Courier kept his thoughts to himself, for obvious reasons, and didn’t comment on the others. Instead he focused on the flying alien spaceship passing overhead. Nobody else seemed to pay it any mind, so the Courier figured it must have been a local and didn’t bring it up, even as it disappeared over the horizon.
Since Linkle had agreed to accompany the Courier to go wrangle up some wigglers (which Bowser deemed as potentially dangerous and used in his own army, which meant that they couldn’t possibly be harmful) he decided to stick around with the group as they meandered and wasted some time. First was a trip to a kitchen, where Bowser was given a list of ingredients. Mmm, some down home cookin’, using whatever you found out in the wild. That was his style. His style, but not his quest. He’d leave such a “dignified” quest to the monarch.
Courier 6 was about to leave Lumbridge when Linkle (obviously) got distracted. He was about to reprimand her when, shock of shocks, she was attracted to a strange breed of chickens. He had seen pictures of these animals in books from before the Great War, but never in person. Like most animals in his world, chickens had gone extinct. Fucking nuclear wasteland. Linkle called them her friends. Really now? So she was good with animals too? This was just too precious to ruin with a good tongue thrashing. He approached and held his hand over the fence alongside the hylian girl, where a “cuccoo” landed on his hand and bawked happily. For the first time in a while he broke his silence.
”Heh. I reckon they like me. No surprise there, most animals take a shinin’ to me even more’n the master they’ve loved fer years. Don’t know why.” He turned to face Linkle and, with Din’s own affirmation, nodded in agreement. ”I’ll make a promise to ya, pardner. We’ll get yer little friends back no matter what, an’ I never break a pardner promise. If’n Boone or Arcade or any of the old posse were here right now, I know they’d tell ya what my word is worth.”
With that said, the Courier took off South, heading for the area where he was supposed to be catching up some wigglers. That was the plan he had laid out, after all. Go south, get wigglers, then head east to the fish monster problem. Two nearby quest areas in a quick pinch, yee-haw! Ah, but walking would take a while, wouldn’t it? If only they had a faster way of getting out there… That’s when the Courier spotted some of those giant birds that were roaming around outside the town. They looked mighty strong, and were certainly big enough to be a good mount! Better than his heracross, anyway. He didn’t imagine the giant beetle was a fast runner.
”Howdy birdies!” he hollered out, waving his arms. A small group of three chocobos stopped what they were doing to stare at the Courier, puzzled and curious. He waved them on over, an invite they took. Though they showed no signs of fear to the Courier himself, they did appear to be wary of his companions. ”There there, birdies. It’s alright,” he said with a drawl, patting the nearest chocobo on the beak. It cooed in appreciation, so he hopped on up without a fuss.
”Perfect. Y’all are welcome t’see if’n they’re willin’ ta let you ride them. In any case, I’m off to wrangle me some wigglers. Feel free to saddle up with me, either way I’ll be headin’ off t’the fish monsters right after. YEE-HAW!” And with that his chocobo mount took off South, running far faster than he had anticipated.
The shoulder slap and encouragement from the pretty boy did nothing for Ratchet, mostly because what he assumed to be Ratchet wasn’t actually there. His hand phased right through the Dec0y hologram. The real Ratchet, invisible, was right up in the thick of the action already bashing the tank zombie around the head, standing atop its shoulders. His invisibility phased out as the Dec0y was spotted for what it really was, but he had already gotten several good thwacks in with his omniwrench. Unlike Gene however, he knew when to get the heck out of dodge. That beeping was signal enough, especially for a lombax who used enough heavy firepower weapons himself. With some well timed backflip hops he was safely out of the danger zone. Gene? Not so much.
The tank exploded violently, spreading ludicrous gibs all over the place. Jak landed, his wings dissipating into the air like a thousand little fire embers dying out, his light form doing much the same. ”Not the brightest bulb in the kitchen, are you?” Jak asked a bit more smug than was necessary.
”Yeah, we were all the way up in the sky and we still recognized the sound of a bomb! What a dingus!” Daxter added.
”Hold up guys, I mean, he took that bomb to the face and still walked away from it,” Ratchet reasoned. ”He’s probably weaker than normal, like the rest of us, and just went off of muscle memory. Maybe at his full power that kind of explosion wouldn’t phase him? After all, you broke your car trying to ram him earlier and didn’t leave a scratch on the guy.”
”Hmf. Fair enough. But he needs to watch himself, because I’m not pulling any of my punches.”
”Guys, guys, set that all aside and let’s focus on the important stuff!” Daxter intervened, sounding abnormally like the voice of reason. ”Who had more kills?” He narrowed his eyes on Ratchet with a condescending grin. Well, that voice of reason lasted all of two seconds, a new personal best. ”Because by my count your puny boom boom gun didn’t do JACK while I-” Jak glared at his friend. ”-I mean WE, took out a dozen, no, a hundred, no A THOUSAND slobbering zombies!”
Clank appeared to counter Daxter’s ludicrous claims. “By my observation the ensuing shrapnel of Ratchet’s explosions fell three nearby zombies, while Jak’s vulcan fury pierced through and destroyed thirty-nine. Would you like a visual playback?”
”Clank!” Ratchet shouted. The little robot ever so slightly recoiled back in surprise.
“... Not helping?”
”Not helping,” Ratchet agreed.
“Then pardon my intrusion.” Clank gave a little bow, then vanished again.
At about this time Nero called for everyone to pack up and head out. Jak and Ratchet were about to race each other over to the tank zombie’s spirit, only for it to have already been taken by one of the others. Damn, too much time arguing! Oh well, there would be others.
Nero pointed out some sort of spire that looked like it was made not from any normal construction material, but of flesh and blood. “Eeeewwww, groddy!” was the thought through Daxter’s head, but he didn’t vocalize it (for once in his life) as they were to be moving through quietly. Even he recognized the importance of not drawing attention to yourself when surrounded in enemy territory! So Jak and Daxter hopped back into the van while Ratchet got back into his kart, and they all took off.
The van came to a halt in less than ideal circumstances, the Blue Falcon kart right behind it. A huge crater blocked their path, necessitating a detour. Situations like these always seemed to be ripe with ambushes, so every hero was alert: Ratchet, Clank, and Jak out of vigilance, and Daxter out of sheer anxiety. The van’s detour took it through a graveyard, first busting down the gates and then bouncing around the stairs. ”WOAH WOAH WOAH HEY! WATCH THE ROAD YOU CRAZY DAME!”
”Oof! I don’t think the kart was made for terrain like this!” Ratchet commented as he followed behind. Something was knocked loose in the engine and parts of the frame cracked. Great that was going to need extra work. The engine began smoking and died, the kart slowing to a total stop near the van.
That’s when all Hell broke loose. A huge demon howled, bursting onto the scene and showing off its ability to turn corpses into yet another variety of zombie. ”Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Jak jumped out of the van, Daxter atop his shoulder. Ratchet sighed and hopped out of the now-dead kart, mourning its loss. Then another of these demons burst from the wall, knocking the van aside and into the void! Gasps came from all three heroes.
”We almost just died!” cried Daxter. Jak didn’t have the time to chastise his friend’s sense of priority, and Ratchet was already springing into action. Nero was displaying absolutelyinhuman strength by planting his feet and single handedly keeping the van from falling to its total doom, but this was taking everything the young demonslayer had, while enemies were quickly advancing on his position. Ratchet decided that he’d be up for some crowd control with his bombuilder, flipping right in front of Nero’s position.
”Locked and loaded!” he said, firing off a proximity bomb into the swarm to thin the numbers early and quickly. It landed directly on the corpse one of the suffering was in the middle of reviving, blasting the thing to smithereens and taking out a good chunk of the surrounding zombies with it… But the suffering only looked to be pissed off.
”Get’im, Jak!” Jak needed no encouragement. He lived for this kind of grim fight. His morph gun switched to blaster form and he unloaded shot after shot of high powered yellow eco into the swarm, each ball of energy burning a chuck out of the zombie it hit. He charged forward as he shot until he came face to face with the suffering that was about to charge.
”Prepare to die!” In a sudden surge of dark eco, Jak gained tremendous muscle mass, pitch black eyes, grayed skin, and long claws. Rippling with the power of dark eco, Dark Jak was ready to tussle with the suffering head on!
“ROOOOOAR!” The suffering slammed him aside almost effortlessly with two massive arms. Dark Jak tumbled along the ground, bouncing like a rubber ball.
”Jak? JAK?! What happened, buddy?!” Daxter shouted into his friend’s face, his own nature protecting him from the dark eco radiating off Jak’s body. Suddenly and without warning Jak’s eyes opened and he let out his own roar. Nearly throwing Daxter off, Jak jumped up and grabbed the nearest object to him, Ratchet’s broken down Blue Falcon.
”Hey! I was gonna fix that!” Ratchet’s protests went unheard and ignored. The metal and plastic began to warp, twist, and burn away. The dark eco arcing through Jak’s body destroyed parts, and altered others so the kart was unrecognizable from its original state. He charged forward, bashing zombies out of his way with the huge club until he came to the suffering again.
”RAAAAAAAAAAAGH!” Dark Jak smashed the kart, rippling with dark eco, right into the suffering with both arms, screaming with rage and adrenaline all the way.
As Iago flew selfishly away, Cassim was left to defend himself and the others with naught but wit and blade. It two short slices two of the shadow creatures fell, dissipated by his swordsmanship. He silently thanked Allah they were so weak, much of a surprise that was, due to the sheer number of them that threatened to become an overwhelming tide. In a shorter skirmish the King of Thieves knew he had nothing to worry about, but this wasn't looking to be a short fight and he was no spring chicken. Cassim knew he might need to trust the rest of these intrepid adventurers more than he was used to trusting.
Unfortunately one of those intrepid adventurers happened to be the boorish hunter from inside the tavern, more concerned with something in the distance than the immediate threat that surrounded them all. He ignored the man as his blade dispatched another shadow on the back swing, leading to Cassim kicking off the alley wall of the tavern and into the open streets where he plunged the blade into another monster, vaporizing it immediately.
The creature Gaston was concerned with made its presence known, attacking the creatures with incredible strength, but this was no beast as the hunter claimed. A stout man with a hunched back, his face disfigured but Cassim saw in this one a powerful heart. Esmerelda and her soldier man recognized this disfigured boy which gave Cassim all the evidence he needed to leave the hunchback alone. He spun his scimitar above his head, slicing the hand off a shadow attempting to get the drop on him, then turned to illuminate the monster with his lantern. With a pained cry, it too departed this world.
Cassim took a deep breath and reoriented himself amidst the chaos. In such a short time more had joined the fray, including a man with skin as tanned as his own but remarkably goofy and uncoordinated, as well as a powerful stead without a master. In addition, the Pumpkin King made known why he held such title, somehow having become wreathed in flame and with a jack-o-lantern upon his bony head. Cassim grinned with excitement, for such legends to be witnessed by his own eye were truly fantastic!
The skinny tanned man was getting overwhelmed, so Cassim reacted with the speed of a whip. He directed his lantern toward the group, and tilted the broad end of his scimitar to focus and reflect the light into a sharp point which cut through a number of the shadows and giving Kuzco an opening with which to escape. "Hurry boy!" he called out. "Group with a partner, don't let yourself get surround-Guk!"
Had he headed his own advice, perhaps Cassim would not have found himself with black wisps encircling his throat, crushing his trachea. That one of these creatures could sneak up on the King of Thieves, well it was unthinkable. And that is exactly why it happened.
"I AM NOT A CHICKEN!" Iago flew overhead, dropping a large brick from his talons. The building block plummeted on a crash course for the shadow constricting Cassim, slamming through its vaporous body, dissipating it and saving his friend. However Iago did not descend to join the rest of them in the battle. "I just don't have a death wish like the rest of these bozos, you talking salamander!"
Level 5 - (37/50) EXP (+3), Level 5 - (4/50) (+3), Level 1 - (2/20) (+3) Location: Land of Adventure, Redgraccoon City Word Count: 1354
Jak&Daxter Level up: Light Jak - Just as the dark eco torture left Jak mutated and able toi transform into a dark beast, so too has his Light Within, along with a little blessing from the Precursor’s themselves, allowed him to transform. Light Jak is luminous, radiating holy light. This form allows him access to a number of powers blessed upon him by the Precursor’s but offers no physical benefit.
Flight: Light Jak sprouts pair of ethereal wings that resemble eldritch tendrils, held together with thin membranes not unlike those of a bat. With these wings Jak can fly to reach new heights and maneuver around, though it is somewhat slow and clunky. This ability takes so little light eco to power it may as well be nothing.
Ratchet was taken aback by the apparent durability of these demons. By all accounts, they seemed to be the small fry of their kind, but the pack had taken an explosion from his bombbuilder head on and still gotten up. It seemed like he would have to take Nero’s words more seriously and not let his rivalry with Jak rile him up too much… But damn, it was so unfair! Jak already had most of his weapons, and had superpowers too! Ratchet was able to compete against Jak the last two times they met thanks to his enormous arsenal, why did he have to get pulled into this world without any of his guns?!
The lombax couldn’t waste another bombbuilder shot on the large swarms of zombies, or the demons. It took some time to regenerate its shots after all, and the city was not only swarming, but also would no doubt have much more dangerous enemies to deal with. Since the only weapon he pulled from those spirits was a tiny handgun, clearly a desperation sidearm, he had to conserve the big gun for when it mattered.
Meanwhile Jak was plowing through zombies with his Vulcan Fury. It’s piercing capabilities really took them down, as a single shot of blue eco could splatter a handful of the suckers and send them all flying. Add to that how rapid fire the gun was and entire swaths of the monsters were nothing but bloody chunks in only a couple seconds! After about five seconds of shooting Jak took his finger off the trigger to shoot Ratchet a smug grin, which Ratchet returned in a mocking way. Nearby Nero obliterated the empusa demons through expert swordsmanship and high-tech weapons that came with his prosthetic arm. Jak smiled, clearly impressed, while Daxter had a giant toothy grin.
”Why don’t we get a sword like that, Jak? Part zoomer-cycle, part sword, ALL danger! V-v-vroom!”
”Maybe we will, if we crush the right spirit.” Jak replied, switching the morph gun to its much more compact and easy to carry scattergun mode. He turned back to Ratchet. ”I’d say that’s about forty for me. Maybe you got one or two in that bomb blast?” he teased.
Ratchet would’ve turned red with the indignity if his fur would’ve showed it. With an expert flick of the wrist he threw his omniwrench toward the defeated empusas, collecting one of their spirits as the wrench returned to him. ”It wouldn’t be any fun if I left you in the dust the whole contest. Letting you get ahead, then overtaking you late game? That’s where the real excitement is.” He crushed the spirit, then stored whatever gear it created for him away in his extradimensional storage space.
”Yeah, sure, whatever you gotta tell yourself to sleep at night, buddy,” Daxter taunted. Ratchet opened his mouth to argue, but it was time to go. Nero and his associate in the van weren’t waiting any longer, not to mention the rest of his crew were ready to get going as well. They had to catch up with the four young men. Resolving to finish the argument later, Ratchet followed.
The van, and other associated vehicles, crested a nearby hill to come across a heated battle already in progress. One hulking behemoth of a zombie was engaged with the four they were looking for, and though they had clearly dealt their fair share of blows it showed no signs of slowing down. The four used some form of magic to stay alive, but clearly it was a struggle just to keep up. Good thing help arrived, signalled by Nero shooting the monster to get its attention.
”Wait, we’ve gotta fight that thing?! Daxter exclaimed, his voice cracking in obvious fear. Jak and Ratchet both turned their heads to stare him down, causing the little ottsel to backpedal. ”Heh, I mean, no problem! That’ll be too easy! We’ve taken on bigger and meaner bruisers back home no problem, right Jak? Why don’t you go all mean and nasty on him?”
”I’ve got something different in mind,” Jak replied, switching the morph gun to Blaster mode. ”When we first got here, the dark eco felt a lot closer, and I couldn’t use my light powers. But the darkness feels… Far away again.”
Ratchet perked up. If Jak was going to do what he thought, and he had Clank with him, this bad boy was absolutely toast! ”You’re gonna freeze time? You know Clank and I have got your back!”
Jak’s entire body suddenly enveloped in a bright luminescence, bright light shining down as if from the Heavens above. It all coalesced around his form, turning Jak into a being of the light. two wings made of pure light sprouted from his back to complete the change. ”I haven’t absorbed enough Light Eco for that yet,” answered Jak. Still, the change was impressive and with some powerful flaps he took to the air, Daxter hanging onto his shoulders. From above Jak began to fire shot after shot of yellow eco from his blaster gun, striking with long range precision damage to the tank’s head and upper torso.
Ratchet shook his head. ”No, it wouldn’t be that easy.” Flipping to the side, Ratchet Ratchet threw his omniwrench at the tank’s knee from behind to force it down, rendering it less mobile and less dangerous while everyone else unloaded into it.
Courier 6 listened closely to the guild woman as she explained how things worked around here, extremely hesitant to give out the ultimate quest to Bowser and the others as a first time mission. Though the Koopa King could intimidate her, the Courier knew and understood where she was coming from. There’s a certain way you build up status within new groups, after all. Everyone starts at the bottom and gradually proves themselves as they work up. That’s how he had to operate within the Brotherhood of Steel, within the NCR, and so many other groups. 6 was about to intervene himself when…
No.
That asshole?!
The guildmaster came sauntering over, and though he bore an uncanny resemblance to the Master of Masters (insofar as a dark cloaked and hooded figure that never shows their true appearance can resemble another), it was clear immediately from his body language and… Language language that they were, in fact, two separate people. Yet the relationship could not be denied. 6 intended to ask questions, to pull some information from this person to gain a stronger understanding of their organization, and just as he was about to speak… Linkle beat him to the punch and completely ruined any element of secrecy he’d be able to operate from.
Grumbling to himself, the Courier took one of the contracts and signed on it with a simple number 6. As Linkle suggested simply completing all of the quests, the Courier nodded in agreement. ”Couldn’t agree more. Already logged them all right here,” he said, tapping his trusty pip-boy on his arm. ”Automatically keeps tabs on all quests and jobs given. See?” He offered a look to Linkle and any others who wanted to give it a gander, scrolling through a number of quests from his own world still marked “OPEN,” as well as the most recent in the “COMPLETED” section: All the Way Home - Escort Bowser and Kirby safely to Mushroom Kingdom castle.
”I reckon I’ll go tangle with them wigglers first. Should be easier’n a bottle of whiskey if’n they’re like any other animals. From there I’ll head over a bit east to deal with them walking fish monsters. If any of y’all want to join me, I’ll welcome the company.”
”CHICKEN?! Watch it buddy, or I’ll bop you right in the snout!” Iago curled up his right wing like a human fist, threatening Mushu in a fight that probably would not end very well for him despite Mushu being a rather pathetic dragon.
Cassim was about to respond to Milan’s declaration of battle, but kept getting cut off by new arrivals. First a scrawny man in a dress tumbled in scared out of his mind and doing terribly to hide it. He babbled at Mulan, clearly having met before. An opening presented itself and so Cassim opened his mouth to-
Once again get cut off, this time by an extremely drunk young woman with massive red curls. What was she even saying? She got uncomfortably close and appeared to be asking a question? Well clearly she was too intoxicated to pay any attention in this dire circumstance-and she has a bow, excellent! Cassim rolled his eyes and jawline, hoping this drunk wasn’t about to turn them all into a pin cushion.
The King of Thieves drew his own sword to prepare for a fight as strange shadow creatures drew near. If his clothing and skin color didn’t give away that he was a foreigner, the curved scimitar absolutely would. ”If any of you happens to see a tall skeleton accompanied by a ghostly hound, they are allies! The King of Halloween is a friendly figure I have already run into tonight.”
Cassim threw himself into battle with the nearest shadow monster, one of the more humanoid looking ones, swinging his scimitar with great skill. Iago on the other hand took to using his most successful and oldest battle tactic: ”I’m out of here! Good luck pal, don’t get killed!”
Rothurage
Old Amsterdam
Mixtape Ghost N
Izurich