NPF Avatars: Pain and Amazement

[Truce]

"Well...shit." Forum trash was one thing. Tigers with lightning bolts shooting their asses and chickens that Kentucky fried you were a whole different matter entirely.

Normally, Ecurt would have summoned plushies to explode in the faces of their enemy. However, considering how crowded this room was and how powerful the bombs would have to be to do any significant damage to them he would probably get caught in the blast himself, and while that's never stopped him before he also had another thing he had to consider: Fenris. Besides, at the rate Raiden was summoning up minions, it would only be a matter of time before they would be overwhelmed.

Taking one last moment to look around before making his decision, Ecurt took a deep breath. "You know what, screw this." And, with that, he threw his new swords into Rhiya's pants, grabbed Fenris' hand, and ran out of the room and back into the tunnel.

Of course, he left behind a couple presents. The first was Gleipnir, though that was him being more forgetful than generous, and the second one was a small box, labled "Pandora's Haxxors."

[Darth SS]

Raiden's damn smug grin came back, and he said one simple phrase.

"However...you're just you. In what world could you ever hope to stand against me? How could you have hoped to match a god's skill with a blade?"

Darth exhaled heavily, trying to keep his voice from quivering. It didn't work well.

"You're right...I haven't practiced since christmas...I can't hope to match your skill with a blade."

A ? appeared above Raiden's head momentarily. Then something totally unexpected happened. Darth grabbed the hilt of the sword and pulled himself up it far faster than Raiden would've thought possible. Then Darth's fist met Raiden's face, smashing him flat on his back. Unsteadily, Darth rose and walked towards Raiden. Without his immortality, the god suddenly found himself with loose teeth, a broken nose, and the world swimming around him. It wasn't going away either.

With a hiss, Darth pulled Raiden's sword out of himself, then looked at the down god. Then he slammed it down right through Raiden's thigh, pinning him onto the ground. Still shaky, he drew his Jericho.

"But...you can't! You've agreed to our duel!"

"I'm not a god-" Darth had to take a moment to gasp. The sword probably hadn't done that much damage, but pulling himself up it had. "-I'm not the definition of honor. I'm not the scale that people judge their qualities against. I'm just a lowly human, ergo, I cheat."

He shot Raiden in the kneecap, removing any chance of him running away. "But...if you wish...I can kill you...with my...hands..." Raiden took the chance to try to punch the now kneeling Darth. His combat knife came up, and Raiden's fist impaled itself on it. He screamed. Darth took a page from the book of Dante, the former NPFer. Namely, his rendition of Devin killing his last nemesis during Cyber Wars.

Darth took hold of Raiden's calf.

"For the path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish-"

Raiden's eyes widened as Darth planted his foot on the knee, and a second later, an inhuman shriek rent the air.

"- and the tyranny of evil men."

He moved over to the other leg.

"Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will-"

A similar procedure ensued, punctuated by Raiden's hellish scream.

"-shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness."

Darth stood, and positioned himself over Raiden's torso. His boot went up... and came down with a sickening crunch.

"For he is truly-"

crunch

"-his brother's keeper-"

crunch

"-and the finder-"

crunch

"-of lost children."

crunch

He looked down at Raiden, eyes glazed over from the incredible pain, hands nerveless at his sides, mouth half-open. How could a human, a mere mortal, have defeated the incarnation of a god's skill? How could this puny being who would cease to exist in a short 50 years be doing this? Darth shrugged. Then, in a single fluid motion, he retrieved his combat dagger, stabbed it down into Raiden's bicep, and drew it down, saw-edge first. As the hapless god forced a scream out through a throat gone raw, Darth gazed into his eyes, as though Raiden were his lover, and hissed softly,

"And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance-"

-here he twisted the blade, eliciting a strangled cry from the maimed god-

"-and furious anger-"

Darth seized Raiden's jaw in his free hand and crushed, feeling the cartliage and bone snap and pop under his super-human grip.

"-those who attempt to poison, and destroy-

The bone shattered, and Raiden convulsed in mindless agony.

"-my brothers."

A listless Raiden looked at Darth, his mind unable to even comprehend the pain that mortals could endure. Darth himself was trembling from exertion and blood loss. But Raiden...he was beyond trembling. The god that he was now existed in a state of horror. Humans were below him, right? He could handle anything they could, right? It would appear he was wrong, as he now found himself experiencing the suffering that thousands of mortals endured every day.

Darth was slightly woozy. "Now for the grand finale. Minor variations of course."

The sounds coming from Raiden's ruined mouth had changed. He seemed to be repeating two sounds - they sounded like knggghllll nghhhhh...

Kill me...

Calmly, Darth stepped over to Raiden body and used his foot to knock it upwards. Then he placed one forearm across his destroyed jaw, eliciting a flinch. The other got a grip on the back of his head.

"And you will know I am not a Lord..."

Darth twisted. Raiden's neck snapped almost effortlessly under Darth's grip. But the god wouldn't be dead just yet. He kept twisting, and Raiden soon found himself staring into Darth's eyes. They were cold, and full of rage.

"...when I lay my vengeance upon you."

Darth kept twisting, and actually broke Raiden's head clean off. Full of rage, he threw it as hard as he could across the room, trying to toss aside that symbol of the friend that had betrayed him.

Slowly, he wobbled away from the destroyed vessel. He lifted his hand, and his lightsaber returned. He placed it back in his arm. The blood loss from a blade right through his digestive tract, possibly nicking his lung, finally caught up to him.

"Good night NPF."

Darth passed out, falling to the ground. He hoped his automatic heal would kick in. He didn't know. On the other side of the room, a door opened. The crowd's cheering and applause went wild...

[POS Industries]

Pedro could only assume the worst.

Limping down the Mashirosen basement corridor, duffel bag on his back, briefcase in his right hand, and Arhra trailing merrily behind him, he could only keep his attention on surviving the next five minutes or so. Raiden or not, the thing behind them was no doubt infuriated by this turn of events. POS had wasted his only real offensive capability, and it worked at least as well as he had intended, but that time was over. Fight or flight was now fully in effect, and alone he only had the latter as an option.

But he wasn't alone! POS stopped, tears welling in his eyes from the pain caused by his hurt ankle, and turned to face Arhra. "Okay, you, um.... Sailor Girl," Pedro suddenly realized that he didn't know her name, "That Raiden guy. It's not really him, I don't think, but he's still pretty tough and..."

Something wasn't right. He looked Arhra in the eyes and she swayed listlessly back and forth, a contented smile plastering her face, and saw that they were looking somewhere in the range of a million miles away. Before he had a chance to say anything, Arhra mumbled, "I've got you now..." and fell forward into Pedro's arms, who did his best to catch her before she cracked her head open on the concrete floor.

"I... but... you... and... he's... GAH!!" POS stammered, staring in disbelief at the slumbering girl. His mind raced. Had she been sleepwalking the entire time? She summoned an entire freaking fire.... guy! Some sort of instinctual reflexive thing triggered by... I don't even know. Crudwafers! Now what?

Granted, Arhra's brief impersonation of a living, breathing person had very effectively saved them both in the short term, but the long term just got a lot harder. Concluding that the Raiden puppet was just about strong enough to kill him, POS had been counting on her to use her summoning powers to destroy it. The "shoot him and run out the window" plan was just to bridge the gap.

They had to keep moving. There was a good chance that puppet was up, about, and ready to tear him limb from limb, and Arhra's apparent narcolepsy was not making things any easier. He could leave her, of course. Raiden would find her and either kill her or wake her up and be killed by her. Either way, it would surely slow him down. On the other hand, if he killed her first, then he'd just go back to hunting POS, who would now have no means whatsoever to fight back. No, she had to come with...

And so he quickly set to work, opening up the duffel bag and dumping out all the "liberated" snacks and magazines from his previous "shopping" excursions, sliding them across the floor to the side of the hallway. He then proceeded to open up the two magically manifested briefcases and dump the vast fortunes within into the empty duffel bag and tossed the now empty briefcases aside to the discarded pile of snacks.

Slinging the lighter bag full of money over his shoulder, he scooped the resting Arhra into his arms and continued limping down the corridor, tears still welling in his eyes from the pain.

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

After several minutes of running, POS was starting to become annoyed. He knew this building like the back of his hand, but no matter where he went, it felt like he wasn't getting anywhere. In fact, he still seemed to be in Basement Level 1, Section 14-Gamma. That couldn't even be possible. One of the operations terminal stations had to be just over....

Then he noticed something that hadn't caught his eye through the pain and adrenaline. To his right, against the wall, there laid a pile of snacktreats, dirty magazines, and two empty briefcases.

POS sighed to no one in particular, "Could somebody please show me the back of my hand...?"

[Raiden]

About halfway through Mesden's beating, Raiden had quit fighting back and simply concentrated on keeping her out of his soul. It couldn't last much longer. Then again, there was no need. The original was merely minutes away from getting what he had come for.

Raiden's mouth was one of the first things to heal. When he moved his lips, words came out softly. However, they weren't solidified runes. Just words to an old rhyme.

"He's got the whole world
in his hands.
He's got the whole wide world
in his hands.
He's got you and me and brother
in his hands.
He's got the whole world in his hands."

************************************************** ********
As Mauve cast her fire spells, Raiden continued to come toward her. The fire spells exploded against his body, making his skin burn and char. A sick smell of burning flesh filled the air.

A fire spell erupted on his upper body, incinerating his left shoulder and making his arm drop.

"Mauve."

A fire spell manifested itself in his gut, burning through his stomach and leaving a wide gaping hole in his torso.

"Mauve!"

A spell surrounded his legs, burning his lower legs to ash and leaving his upper legs pockmarked. He dropped to the ground as his legs left him, and he began to crawl forward with his one working arm.

"MAUVE!"

His arm reached out and clung to the bottom of her cloak. One final fire spell set his entire body aflame. And after so much damage had been done, he couldn't escape it. His white hair lit up, the skin looked like a piece of meat burned on the grill, and the glowing energy seemed to leave his eyes. When the flames got to the fat in his body, it did nothing but stoke the fire even more.

Without his full regenerative abilities, Raiden's body had its limits. And they were just hit.

With what seemed like a sigh, Raiden's fist kept its tight hold on her cloak, even when his mind stopped functioning, and this Raiden died.

************************************************** ********
Raiden whistled. The supposedly 'dead' Raiju lifted its head from where it was resting. The creature turned from the weasel to the large cat form. It started sniffing at the Pandora box.

"What'd you find, Raiju?"

[Premmy]

OOC: since both garud and Raiden claimed to get the star I figured I'd eliminate cofusion a bit
IC:Red was hiding away in a corner steadily supplying his sword with high number force gems, soon The Four Sword would be at it's full power and have all of it's abilities, namely the power to break magical barriers like the one given to raiden by the super star, but they wanted the big one, the power to repel evil. That would give them some insight about Raiden. Green and purple were fully focused on keeping raiden busy they moved to attack even though they knew it was pointless, both got way too close and tried to stab Raiden with beam swords, the four sword was far too valuable to risk breaking it. Blue paired with Garud and gave him his star,this new monster would need it, something was'nt right about Raiden. As Green amd purple futily slashed at raidens glowing hide, the four swords at their waists glowed with a bright golden light...

[The Wizard Who Did It]

The Wizard looked around at the rather electrical display around him. You have got to love when your opponent plays into your hands. The dragons stared at the Wizard, and the Wizard stared right back. The first lesson about magic is creating life. When you create life, such as a mass group of plants, the spell will change the environment to a limited degree. The environment will became better able to support that being grown or made. Such as creating a more humid environment when growing plants. Another detail was that, in the face of massive quantities of opposing elements, magic seemed to stabilize itself to deal with the problem. This stabilization generally occurred at the expense of the area around it. In summery, the area was now humid, and mixing alternate elements made a big non-elemental explosion. Of magic. Which is what the Wizard’s natural resistance defended against, and what the puppet had little defense against. I am totally not spelling out what is about to occur here.

Charon is going to be my biggest concern here. I can take what is about to occur, but I have not learned yet what Charon can take. The puppy was laying there, alert, but at the same time relaxed. His gentle breathing made the shadows, caused by the relatively large ball of energy, play on his short black snout. The Wizard now had a large aura of dark blue energy around him, and he raised his hand toward the Puppet. With a grin, the energy expanded into the world around him, creating and forcing water after the electrical beings around him. He quickly moved his hands up to entrap Charon in his arms. His wings wrapped around his body, protecting the dog from outside dangers.

The electrical beings were pushed toward the walls. The water swirled around like a vortex, mixing with the electric particles. A bright light illuminated the area from the walls, and the Wizard held his dog tightly, as the world exploded around him.

[Dragonsbane]

Dragonsbane made his way through the silent tunnel, only to find himself in a strange area. It was large and expansive. It was night time. The darkness and the three moons hanging above them gave it away. A cool wind could be felt. Standing all alone in the room was Raiden.

"Dragonsbane. What little pocket of unwanted void did YOU crawl out of?"

"A fascinating question. Technically speaking, a place can only be void if it contains no matter, and as I am clearly composed of matter, I could not therefore have come FROM a void, merely traversed it in the form of energy." Dragonsbane chided, as if speaking to a small and unruly child who had just asked a foolish question.

"This is it?" his tone indicated he meant far more than the room, his eyes piercing the doll's form as if it wasn't even there, instead studying the magical makeup of the construct, "How entertaining, a simulacra with tactically destructive abilities! I might end up enjoying myself after all." he chuckled, then waved a hand dismissively, "Whatever, child, I'll allow you to make the first move."

[Inbred Chocobo]

The door was locked. IC noticed DB passing by but he ignored him and DB seem to do the same. He looked up an realized they all had names over each other. "Don't see mine anywhere. Guess its time for plan b." Inbred said to no one as he stepped outside.

He looked up at the tower, which still loomed quite tall. "Guess I better get started if I am going to do this." He continued talking to himself, life he didn't care. He pulled out a couple hooks, walked over to the side of the tower, and started the climb up.

[mauve]

Mauve stared blankly down at the smouldering body at her feet. She felt numb.

Had she been more of the "action hero" type, she might have given some kind of corny victory line at this point. Something along the lines of "Guess I roasted HIS coffee beans!" or something similarly lame. But she wasn't an action heroine.

"Raiden?" she called tentatively. There was no reply. She sank slowly to her knees, keeping a wary eye on the body, just in case. "Raiden?"

He was dead, a voice in her head noted with absolute certainty. This Raiden was no more. He had ceased to be. He was an ex-Raiden.

Carefully she pried the blackened hand from her skirt. Parts of his skin crumbled and flaked away as soon as she touched him. He had been burned to death, and then some. Oh, great. Now she was going to feel guilty for getting carried away with the fire spells.

She should feel good about this. She had been all alone with a super-strong Raiden clone, and she survived it. Not only survived, but kicked ass! Well, sorta. Okay, she kicked very little ass in the grand scheme of things. But still, it was a mage versus god battle, and the mage came out on top. It was like putting Vivi against Sephiroth-on-steroids and winning!

She really didn't feel like celebrating right now, though. Her throat ached; she imagined it was probably red and starting to bruise right now. Her MP was at the half-full mark, and her adrenaline rush was wearing away, leaving her feeling tired. And to top it off, she couldn't supress the thought that she had just torched and murdered an extention of the God of Thunder. Her friend.

"Forget it," she found herself saying harshly to the pile of ashes. "I don't have time to sit around with an ash tray." She pushed herself up and brushed off her skirt. Now all she had to do was get out of this fake coffee shop and back to the tower. She would definately have PLENTY to say to Raiden now.

[Mesden]

She lifted her hand to stare at the singing Raiden. The body was far more mangled then she thought it was. Tera and indentions. Like he was hit by a meteor storm.

She stepped up and walked over to the still singing Raiden. His voice slightly haunting. He could now stand up and looked down at Mesden. Staring with the still soft light of her world.

"Your pathetic. Look at you. The greatest God around, huh? You remember saying that, right? Everyone loved you. I could see it too. You were like a treasure. What are you now? A piece of rust? And you are now bringing your and my dad into this? What the hell is wrong with you? You are like some little kid. You threw away everything for what? It had better be something good to becuase He is able to take you down with a gesture. Sing your erie song and know your iminent demise. YOu sick bastard."

She stood there for a few following seconds. The Raiden had ceased his erie singing and just stared at her. He lifted his hand a bit as if he were going to say something, but decided against it at last thought.

"I'm sorry, Mes. I have to do this. Understanding is something you will know when I have accomplished this. And no, not even He can stop me at this point. If it makes you feel any better, you are a lot better at fighting than I remember."

She scoffed at his remark a bit and turned away from him. On her way back to her throne of color and light she blurted, "You haven't seen anything yet Raiden. I am saving that for when we get our REAL fight. Not some suped up rip off of you with one power that you considered almighty and yet I beat it without much strain in all seriousness. Watch out Raiden, wherever the hell you are, because you couldn't have ever felt what your clone has felt before. That was a joke of a beating compared to what you will get."