AC: Round 3 - Zack Blaze

[Revenant]

This thread is reserved for Zack Blaze. The thread will open September 30th and will be closed after two weeks.

Good Luck!

[Zack Blaze]

Concentrate! Zack’s thoughts steadied on this one word as he stirred out of yet another Adventurer’s Crown induced sleep. Concentrate….concentrate….concentrate!

His eyes sprung to life, his arms attempting to shoot forward, only for the youth to find his limbs chained to the wall behind him. His clothes were in tatters, much worse than they had been in the previous rounds, and his throat was dry. His body was developing a slightly foul odor from both his mouth and his armpits; his hair had become a tangled mess dangling in front of his face. He could hardly see much, his eyes taking longer than normal to adjust to the dreary room. The boy's very joints pounded with pain, and his vision was quite blurry from something or someone (though they were slowly recovering). He attempted to pull himself free from the steel shackles at his wrists, greeted with only the sounds of metal clanking against metal.

“New…” Zack managed to speak out, though the words came out as a scratchy whisper, “the chains are new…”

He could feel his body throbbing with the ache of suffering from a beating, maybe several. His head pulsated at a rather uncomfortable rate, and it was all the teen could do to examine his surroundings. His gaze shifted downwards, to the silver shackles that gripped at his ankles, held in place by more chains connected to the wall behind him. The air had stagnated and combined with Zack’s own budding natural musk to assault his delicate senses.

He looked back up, blowing some mussed hair out of his face to look at his cell. Polished iron bars lined up in front of him, a wall of metal to stop him from escaping. To his right was something the teen could only describe as a wooden fold-out bed. Even in the dimly lit room, he could catch the occasional termite skittering over the surface of the dungeon décor. The room was filled with an eerie silence, save for the occasional sound of an insect running across the stone flooring.

“Cozy,” Zack coughed out, the word losing its sarcasm beneath the hacking.

Concentrate! his thoughts took control once more, as if trying to jump start his body. He lifted his head up, a shot at forming some saliva to wet his palette. He was met with more miserable gasps and coughs. He moved his eyes back and forth, scanning for some sort of food or drink. He sighed, his thoughts trying to recall how he wound up here, beaten, battered, and with no method of escape. All the while, his mind shouted the same words: Concentrate! Concentrate! Concentrate!

He lowered his head and let his body go limp, allowing his damning bonds to support his weight. The rays of the sun from outside tickled the back of his neck, his breaths starting to grow heavy. He could feel the warmth but there was a chill from inside his bones, causing his weakened form to slouch upon the precipice of death.

He was roused to a cold substance flowing against his lips. His eyes slowly opened, finding his own reflection in the bowl of what appeared to be water. His tongue instinctively began lapping up the water like a thirsty hound, paying no mind to the lack of tact displayed. His body did not care about being polite, only survival. As the refreshing liquid made its way down his throat, he cool feel the cool element revitalizing him slightly and restoring his will to live. His eyes shifted upwards, meeting a figure with long brown hair, and eyes of the same hue. His mind stopped yelling at him to concentrate long enough to register the form on this stranger.

“Ceidon Lore….”

[Zack Blaze]

Ceidon Lore had been one of Zack’s three partners during the first round of the tournament. He claimed to be some sort of treasure hunter, though he seemed to lack the skills typically required for such a profession. Zack found Ceidon to be, for lack of a better word, a complete and utter moron. He got his team lost in their search, almost killed them in more than one instance, and worst of all, his gruff voice was something Zack compared to throwing a bag of gold pieces into an airship engine.

“How’s it going kid?” Zack took the older man’s question as some form of bad joke, and responded only through lapping up the last traces of water. Once Ceidon had realized that his former companion had finished, he set the bowl upon the ground, shaking his head disapprovingly. Zack could see the grin on the smug face of the adventurer, and longed to punch the demeaning smirk off of his features.

“If you’re here to rescue me,” Zack said, a snarl in his voice that wasn’t meant to reveal itself, “hurry up and do it.” His reply in kind was a deep laugh that sent goosebumps across his form. Ceidon rubbed the back of his head, small bits of what Zack could only assume was dandruff starting to fall from his hair. It was okay that the older man had not said anything; his silence was all the answer that Zack needed. “You….you’re the one that put me here?”

“That’s our Zack Blaze for you,” Ceidon finally spoke up, “If you’re not below him, you’re betraying him.” He made his way over towards the wooden bed, the termites scattering in different directions under the darker shade of black cast by Ceidon’s shadow. He sat on the furniture, the boards seeming to groan in response under the man’s frame. Zack watched as Ceidon laid himself upon the bed, his arms being used to support his head like a pillow. “Where do these assumptions come from, Zack Blaze?”

“Would you quit using my full name?!” the youth snapped at Ceidon, “Just call me Zack, not Zack Blaze! Do you know how annoying it is to hear things like ‘Help me, Zack Blaze!’ or ‘We did it, Zack Blaze’?! I swear, if you hadn’t just given me some water…” Zack thrust his arms forward with a new vigor, but the chains that bound him to the wall showed no signs of relenting. “Your only value in this entire tournament has been helping me win it!”

“You’re avoiding the question,” Ceidon remained calm and collected despite his former partner’s outburst, “Besides, I don’t have the key.”

“Then get out of my sight,” Zack whispered, his nostrils catching wind of his own rancid breath, “You’re nothing but a pawn that has outlived its usefulness…”

“The thing about pawns, Zack Blaze,” Ceidon sat back up from his laying down position, the wood once more screaming at the shift “Is if you manage to get them across the board, they become a queen. Just like that, the most useless piece of the game becomes the most valuable. From nothing to greatness. Isn’t that what you’re trying to achieve, Zack Blaze?”

Zack spit upon the ground, turning his head away from the adventurer. He heard Ceidon let out a small laugh. “Now you don’t have anything to---- WHOA!”

The sound of breaking wood dragged his attention back towards the adventurer, only to see nothing but a pile of broken wood. Dust rose up into a cloud above, and dozens, if not hundreds, of termites made their way across the floor towards varying bug-sized exits. Almost sensing that he was speaking to a figment of his imagination, Zack looked straight down, towards the bowl of water to also find nothing. All the while, his consciousness continued to push the same word through. CONCENTRATE!

“Then why don’t I feel thirsty anymore…” Zack whispered, the sudden feeling of being watched overcoming him. He turned his head to the left to find nothing, then to the right to find the destroyed furniture.

“Ceidon really did a number on that, huh?” Zack turned back towards his left, his eyes meeting the milky pupils of a girl with multiple blonde pigtails, a larger than normal head, and a set of bangs that seemed to rival Zack’s own. The girl in question was looking at the former bed, and by proxy, Zack, from the side of the wall beside the street fighter. She had her head peeking out of a somewhat small black hole in the wall, presumably where the rest of her body was hidden.

“Hiya Zack!” The girl, known to Zack only as Itera, smiled and waved at her now shocked former teammate.

[Zack Blaze]

Zack stood there for a minute, questioning whether or not he was truly looking at yet another one of his former teammates. Long trails of steal escaped from the hole Itera was so casually popping out of. The fumes danced across Zack’s nose, teasing his senses with a menagerie of flavor. Zack closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, allowing the great smell to overwhelm him. Itera saw this, and looked from the teen, to inside her makeshift portal, and then back to Zack.

“Would you like some?” A wicked smile crept across the girl’s features, pulling a small folding fan from her pocket dimension. She unfolded the item, waving the fan casually towards Zack. Another growl came from the pit of his gut, a reaction to the delicious, soupy smell boiling a few feet away. With each flick of Itera’s wrists, the fan pushed more of the steam his way, enveloping him in its allure. Zack nodded to the girl, secretly cursing himself for giving into such baited temptations. After all, Itera was a mischievous fairy. Zack figured that by giving in to his desires, the trouble maker would simply disappear with a giggle.

Itera ducked into her portal, the hole sealing up quickly behind her with a strange sucking sound. Zack sighed, bowing his head in shame. Much to his surprise, however, the same awkward noise filled his ears once more, and before he knew it, Zack had a spoon full of rabbit stew in his mouth. He chewed softly on the meat, unsure if his mysterious torturers had loosened any of his teeth with their beatings. When he finished his first spoon full, Itera quickly pushed another into his mouth. Zack quickly realized that the girl simply had to get closer to him in order to feed him.

“Do you really want to go through life not trusting anybody, Zack?” Itera spoke as if she was just making small talk, but her subject matter being Zack’s own thoughts was quite eerie. “I mean, life isn’t really fun if you don’t have anybody to share it with. From what I heard, you made it into round two of this tournament got paired with someone you admire, and still treated him as if he were lower than dirt. Do you think it’s better for your friends to see you as a jerk face?” Zack sat in silence as Itera continued to spoon feed him like a baby.

As the next spoon came towards him, Zack closed his mouth tight, the hot spoon pushing against his lips. “I…I never really had any friends,” Zack spoke as casual as a person saying they never owned a pet, “I tried to make some when I was little, but I was always a little too scrawny to play their games. I would always be picked last for sports, if at all, so I got used to watching.” As Zack finished his exposition, another bite of rabbit stew was snuck into his mouth. The boy glared at his giggling fairy companion, but he continued to chew none the less.

“What do you mean, you watched?” Itera tilter her head to the side, pausing with the next portion.

“I mean I sat away from the other kids, and I watched them play. Like I said, I didn’t really have the frame for sports, but that didn’t mean I could not learn the game. So that’s what I did. I sat on the sidelines, watching the others enjoy themselves while I picked up the various rules and penalties for each little activity they did. They still picked on me, but in the end, I had gained a valuable tidbit of knowledge to aid me in my adult life.” Zack now chomped at the spoon, his teeth comfortable with the tender meat, tearing it to digested shreds in a matter of seconds.

“What lesson was that?” Itera attempted to grab another helping of food as she looked towards the teen, only to find that the stew had been fully consumed.

“The guy who knows all the rules, controls all the games.” Zack smiled, flexing his muscles in a pitiful way to try and break out of his chains. The steel still would not give, despite Zack’s best efforts to break it through sheer force. “I don’t suppose you could just teleport these things off me with your portal, huh?”

“Not unless you want to live your life carrying around a castle wall. On your back” Zack thought on this for a moment before shaking the notion from his head.

“Well, can you at least find me a key?”

“Sure thing! Be back in a jiffy!” Itera spoke excitedly, ducking back into her hole, the odd noise following her disappearance. Zack smiled, glad that his luck was now taking a turn for the better. Minutes soon turned to hours, and the sunlight in the cellar was replaced by the beams of the moon. About halfway into hour number six, Zack had lost all hope that Itera was coming back. Worse still, he could feel his eyes getting heavy, and his strained body growing weary from the long hours spent in his precarious position.

“The thing is…” Zack whispered to the termites, though he spoke as if they were Itera, “when you control the game, you find yourself with nobody wanting to play in the first place…”

And with that, he slept.

[Zack Blaze]

The sound of gnats buzzing around his ears slowly brought him back into reality. He tried to swat at the bugs, forgetting where he was for a moment, only to have his memory jogged by the steel shackles around his wrists. He looked to his arms, where several whelps had formed across his exposed flesh, resembling a big white island amongst a sea of red. All around him, mosquitoes, gnats, and even moths fluttered about, buzzing, biting and generally annoying.

His clothes had slightly bigger holes in them now; most likely the doing of the moths. The gnats constantly whizzing around his ears made him yearn for the ability to just swat one of the pesky insects one good time. Worst of all was the mosquitoes, for with each bite they made upon his skin, his arms felt like it was that much more on fire. His fingers twitched to and fro, as if they had minds of their own, trying to relieve the itchy feeling in his limbs. He screamed in frustration after jerking his body about for a few moments; the sensation was truly unbearable.

He looked down to the brick floor for a few moments, contemplating how best to remedy his current problem, when he suddenly felt the relieving sensation of his whelps being scratched. He shifted back over to his arm, half-expecting the dainty fingernail of a returned Itera to be helping. Instead, his gaze met with a yellow fingernail, large and chipped, scraping at the itchy spots. The fingernail in question was connected to a large blue finger, bigger than most people’s arms. His eyes followed the finger to an arm of matching color, and then further to a large, gray-blue face.

His scratching savior smiled, teeth yellow and chipped like his fingernails, his hair a greasy looking white. Zack looked into the milky white pupils of the ogre that stood before him, a shocked expression painted across his features. “Makai…. You came for me. How….”

“Did I know where you were?” Makai interrupted, “Your book. The one that you use to control me. I guess I have sort of a link to it. I can detect where it is, guess because when you first used it on me, it formed a sort of bond with me. When I found it with you not there, I took a wild guess that you got yourself captured. Seriously, princess, what would you do without me?”

“Be in need of some scratching, that’s for sure,” Zack weakly smiled, motioning his head towards the other arm. “Out of all the people in the world to come and rescue me, I would have thought you’d be the last. I am sort of controlling you against your will.”

Makai’s finger went over to the other arm, reliving the building tension the mosquitoes had caused. “Yeah, well, turns out, life is pretty boring without you,” Makai’s spoke in his casually deep, echo-like baritone, “I hate to admit it, but I rather enjoy the little adventures you and I go on.” The monster reached for the chains, tugging on them fiercely only to find that the binding steel would not give from the wall.

“Yeah, well, when I get out of whatever this place is, we’ll definitely have a good old time kicking the ass of whoever put me here.” Zack watched as his ‘friend’ struggled against the chains, loud grunts coming from the behemoth.

“Wait, you don’t know where you’re at by now?” Makai paused for a moment, the chain slacking once more. Zack raised an eyebrow, shaking his head in a confused manner. “Zack, think about it for a moment. Who would want to keep you from the finals of the Adventurer’s Crown? Who wouldn’t want you with a book of ultimate knowledge?”

CON! CEN! TRATE! CONCENTRATE! CONCENTRATECONCENTRATECONCENTRATECONCENTRATE!

“Oh my god…” Zack said, finally piecing everything together. “I’m in the dungeon of Kenneth Stern…”

[Zack Blaze]

He jerked at the chains in an uncontrollable frenzy. The ringing of the steel links echoed in the dusty dungeon as he thrashed around in anger. Kenneth Stern had organized this tournament, invited anybody to try their hand at the Adventurers Crown, and now he was keeping one of the contestants imprisoned against his will. It was no better than holding a sporting event, and then making sure one team never showed up.

“Zack, stop!” Makai insisted, his large hands, the size of most people’s heads, were placed firmly on the street fighter’s shoulders, “Control yourself!”

“I’ll kill him, Makai! I’ll make sure he’ll regret ever doing this to me! He’s a dead man walking, you hear me?! He’s----“

“Stronger than you in every sense of the word.” Makai spoke calmly, reservation an odd trait for an ogre to possess, “If you fight him alone, you will die. He has magic, and you have nothing. In strength, he beats you ten times out of ten. I wouldn’t even put it above him that he’s quicker than you too. If you fight Stern alone, you will die.”

Zack paused for a moment to think on his friend’s words, deep breaths finding their way out of the teen’s lungs. His hair had fallen in front of his face once more, Makai parting the bangs to the side of his master’s face for him. “You’re…you’re right. I can’t do it alone.”

He sighed looking to Makai once more, going over the large creatures features as he tried to formulate a plan. Makai was muscular, even by ogre standards, most of his body being pure muscle rather than fat. Strapped to his back was a large club, chunks of whatever he had bashed in for the day still splattered across the spikes lining the top of the weapon. A breeze blew in from Zack’s window, nearly blowing away the one piece of clothing the chiseled Makai actually wore; a deer skin loincloth that went down to his knees.

“Help me,” Zack said, a smile now upon his face, “Stern may be more experienced and stronger, but it will be hard for someone even as powerful as him to fight two people at once. Once I get out of here, come with me, and we’ll make Stern regret ever tying down Zack Blaze.”

Makai grinned, a sadistic look for one so large. He crossed his arms and nodded, looking behind him for a moment. “There’s just one thing I don’t get. Why go through all this effort of letting you get to the finals only to imprison you?”

Zack shrugged his shoulders, the fatigue in his body slowly making itself known once more. “I don’t know, but you can be sure we’ll beat the answer out of him. First priority will be finding a way to get in contract with Misery Business. If I can call in some reinforcements, then I can make sure Stern won’t get any backup during our fight.”

There was a scowl on Makai’s face now, as if he had just eaten something rather sour. “I’ve been thinking about that. Do you know how long you’ve been in this cellar?” Zack shook his head in reply, “Because if it’s been longer than a couple of days, I would have thought a place as powerful as Misery Business woulda made sure to mount a rescue attempt.”

Zack had thought about this during his incarceration, but the severity of it did not strike him until Makai had said it out loud. Why hadn’t Misery Business come and freed him from this dungeon? What was so important to the company that they would lose one of their top agents in the field over it? Gnats buzzed around his face once more, but they had become less annoying than the questions that were now nagging at Zack from inside his mind.

His thoughts were interrupted by sounds from above. He did not recognize any of the voices, though he could have sworn he had heard the words ‘He’s down here!’ He could see a couple of shadows pass over Makai’s form, and the beast himself had even started looking up behind Zack; presumably at the window. Makai looked back to his master, and nodded solemnly. “I’ve got to take care of those guards,” he said, cracking the knuckles in both of his hands as he did so, “I’ll be right back.”

Zack watched as his friend walked away, into the shadows. He could barely make out Makai’s large form as he ascended what Zack could only assume were stairs. Soon, there were sounds of fighting, of things being smashed with a sickening crunch, and screams from people who were not Makai. Finally, he heard a roar that no human could ever make, followed by one of the unknown voices yelling ‘Got him!”

And once again, Zack was alone.

[Zack Blaze]

Zack waited in the silence for minutes, maybe even hours. Such a dank place made him lose all sense of time. The bugs had gotten worse, a swarm of gnats now buzzing around his face. It didn’t matter to him anymore; his last hope had just been purged from this world, and Zack was now forced to live out his days the prisoner of an adventuring madman. His stomach growled once more, reminding him that he would probably starve to death in a few days.

“Wow. Never thought I’d see the day where Zack Blaze gave up,” a smarmy little laugh came from the shadows. Zack looked towards the source of the voice, his eyes growing wide as the figure brought himself into better lighting. Spiky blonde hair, green emerald like eyes, and a matching green jacket around his form. The youth shook his head in disbelief, certain that he must have been hallucinating the doppelganger that stood before him.

“You’re not real,” Zack whispered, turning his head to not give his approaching imposter the time of day. A rough hand grabbed the boy by the cheeks, turning him back to look at the mirrored freckled face of his doppelganger. “You’re not real” Zack repeated.

“I’m as real as your mind made me, Zacko,” the other Zack said, “you finally listened to your brain, finally concentrated. And now, I’m here to deliver you an epiphany.” He tapped the side of his head as if he were telling his shackled form to think. “You know why Stern locked you up here; your head has been screaming it at you this entire time. You just got to concentrate a little more.”

“You’re not real,” Zack said plainly now, as if the words were the only thing keeping him sane. “You’re not real.”

“I’m as real as you let me be, Zack,” the mimic leaned toward the original’s ear, whispering “Stern isn’t trying to kill you. He just doesn’t want you to win.” Zack two leaned out of the ear of the true Zack Blaze, making a fist and holding it high into the air. He took a few steps back as sparks o electricity crackled and popped around the formed fist of the double, as if his hand were pure static. “You have the potential to do anything Zack, anything at all.”

Lightning crashed to the ground from out of nowhere, causing the genuine Zack to jump in a startle. Copy Zack unfurled his fist, a huge beam of water shooting towards the ceiling, slamming down and causing a makeshift rain of sorts. With his free hand, the doppelganger seemed to backhand the air, a large trail of flame following his hand. “Zack Blaze, Kenneth Stern is afraid of you because of the power you have inside of you. You have the power to change Althanas. You, Zack, have the power to become the King of Althanas.”

The words sunk in, and the original’s fists were now clenched in anger. The power of this copy was unrivaled, thought it would have been nice if he could have broken the genuine Zack’s shackles. He was frustrated; angered at being told he could do something he obviously could not. He had concentrated as hard as he could, and all that he got was a holier-than-thou version of himself. He had had enough of this.

“YOU’RE! NOT! REAL!” As Zack screamed the last word, his right fist ignited into a blue flame, the fire growing in intensity as Zack raged at his clone. Beads of sweat formed around his forehead, attracting even more bugs. The youth released a scream of frustration, the fire in his right hand now the length of an average person’s arm. The fire exploded like a metaphor for Zack’s rage, a sound of metal hitting the floor filling the room as Zack pointed towards his internal self. “Go away! You’re not real!”

The double grinned and shrugged his shoulders casually. “Fine, whatever, I’ll go. But just so you know,” the form began to dissipate like a fine mist, “you just broke one of your shackles.”

With that, the Zack double had completely disappeared, the youth looking at his right hand, still pointing towards where his clone was. The fire was gone, but his wrist had become unshackled. He quickly tried to grab at the other shackles, tried to free himself from the tight bonds. Once he had been found wanting, the shackles unable to unlock from just his free hand, Zack began to focus on the next priority. He swatted at gnats and scratched his mosquito bites, his mind now casually plotting his next move.

[Zack Blaze]

He swatted at his insect foes, his mind still pondering on his situation. He tried to conjure fire into his left hand, an attempt to repeat the miracle he had performed with his right, but all he could muster were the small flames that licked at the air before disappearing into nothingness. He sighed in frustration, the fires growing weaker with each subsequent attempt. Zack bit his lower lip, his eyes scouting the area for anything that could be used to free him now that he had a new perspective.

He had become so engrossed in his search, that he never even heard the ruckus going on upstairs. In fact, the only time his attention was directed towards something else was when two bodies came flying down the stairs and into a wall with a hard thud. Zack winced at the hit, though he could not actually see the damage the random bodies had suffered. Another silhouette made its way down the stairs, though the form was too small to be that of Makai.

The figure slowly made its way over to the two downed people, a sharp object of some sort being shoved down into their necks. Zack could hear the sound of blood splattering against the wall, as well as the odd triangle-like blade being removed from the corpses. The shadow then turned towards Zack, slowly approaching him like a lion would stalk a gazette stuck in a trap.

Zack stepped back, his spine touching the bricks behind him. His eyes held a bit of fear for whomever or whatever was approaching him, though he still threw a few practice punches in the air. Maybe, he thought to himself, maybe I can intimidate him, as long as he doesn’t get close enough to realize that…

The stranger paused for a minute, nothing on his person illuminated quite yet by the moon’s candescent light. “A small laugh came from the shadows, and with the echo that the dusty dungeon provided, made it sound like the voice was all around Zack. “Do you really plan to fight me with one arm?” The figure asked nonchalantly, as if he were addressing someone below him in social status.

Well, shit.

“Who are you?” Zack finally built up the nerve to ask, throwing a few more single jabs into the air for good measure. “Obviously, you don’t care for Stern, or you wouldn’t have killed what I can only hope are his guards. He obviously doesn’t like me, or I wouldn’t be here right now. So whats say you and I team up to get some old fashioned style revenge going on?”

“How silly you are, Zack Blaze,” the strange figure asked, stepping out of the shadows and into the beams of the moon. He wore a long duster style trench coat, which had been splattered with fresh blood. His hair was slicked back and in a small ponytail, his eyes hidden beneath two black shades. He had a smirk that, for some reason, made Zack feel very uneasy. He spoke once more, his pink lips seemingly highlighted among his sickly white skin. “We’ve been on the same side this entire time. Don’t you know who I am?”

“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be asking you who you were,” Zack spoke behind clenched teeth. The street fighter loved playing games, but hated when he was the game piece in question. A small fire began to ignite in his right hand, his anger at this coy killer building. “I’ll ask one more time. Who are you?”

The man took a deep bow, his sunglasses never falling off, as if they were bonded to him somehow. “My name is Roberto Monstro Uccisore. I am the Vice President of Misery Business Incorporated.”

[Zack Blaze]

When Roberto introduced himself, the flame in Zack’s right hand instantly extinguished. Misery Business Incorporated was the company that the youth had been working with for weeks. In fact, the only reason Zack had entered the Adventurer’s Crown at all was because it had been a direct order from the higher ups at Misery Business. Up until now, the youth had never encountered any of the senior staff, his contacts with the company being mostly through lower level interns and the like. The sheer fact that the vice-president was here with him could only mean that Misery Business had something really important here.

“Let’s get you out of those shackles, shall we?” Roberto stood up making a fist with both of his hands. Zack stood there in astonishment as the fingers of the man seemed to sink into his palm, which in and of itself was taking on a cone like form. Several small spike spurted out from the cone, and the new ‘hands’ began to spin around and around in a circle. There was a whistling noise as the hands, which had now become peach colored drills, spun through the air. Robert walked casually over to the wall, where the chains were connected to a flat piece of metal, and began to pry his hands in between the brick and the steel.

“H-How did you know Stern was holding me here?” Zack spoke softly, his demeanor completely changed in the face of the vice-president.

“Truth is, we didn’t,” Robert spoke loudly, of the sound of grinding metal between him and the younger Zack, “Last we had heard from you, you had made it to the finals of the Crown. After that, you sort of disappeared off the face of Althanas. Luckily, someone had the bright idea to follow Makai, thinking he might lead us to you. Don’t know how he pulled it off when other people couldn’t, but it seems that it was the right thing to do.”

As Roberto finished, the metal was pried off of the wall, falling downwards and stopping just inches before hitting the ground thanks to it still being connected to Zack’s arm. Roberto kneeled downwards and started a similar procedure on the binding piece of steel that kept the street fighter’s legs in shackles. “We didn’t actually think you could make it to the finals without Stern catching wind of us, but it seems he’s figured out that you’re one of our agents. I’m not sure how much he knows about us, but it’s enough to warrant keeping you down here until the tournament finished.”

“Why doesn’t he want me to compete?” Zack asked, fleshing his left arm a bit, the sound of the chains clinging together now sounding like liberation rather than confinement.

Roberto looked up as the next piece of metal came off the wall, a small cloud of dust floating upwards into Zack’s nostrils and causing the boy to sneeze. “I figured you would have that all figured out by now, being as smart as you are. He’s afraid you’re going to win the whole thing, and he isn’t ready to entrust someone he knows next to nothing about holding that book of his.”

“Wait a minute…Kenneth Stern is scared of me?” Zack asked quietly as the drill-handed man moved on to the final binding strip of steel. Hearing it from a hallucination was one thing, but to hear it from the top brass of his job was another.

“Apparently,” Robert replied, the last piece chipping out with little effort.

“Good,” Zack said with a new determination in his voice, his right hand gripping the dangling chain bound to his other hand and straightening it in front of him. “He should be.”

[Zack Blaze]

“What happened to Makai?” Zack asked as he and Roberto walked through the spiraling tower of Kenneth Stern. The trip out of the dungeon had been unremarkable, save for the two gaping holes in the necks of the Stern’s guards. Zack knew that he may not like the answer, and there was a lump in his throat that made him fear the worst for his only true friend.

“We found him bleeding to death in the court yard,” Robert replied, his calm tone and straight-to-the-point manner of speaking starting to grate on Zack’s nerves (though the street fighter would never openly admit such a thing to his savior). “He’s a stubborn one, but the boss decided to get him patched up and personally escort him back to the headquarters for medical attention. He has a certain respect for loyalists, no matter what kind of loyalist they are.”

There was a slight change in Roberto’s voice as he described the president of the company. Even someone as strong as him had a sort of admiration for their leader. Zack could tell this because the teen had the same respectful tone when he talked to Roberto.

They slowly made their way up the spiral stair from the dungeon into the courtyard, where Makai’s green blood tainted the dirty ground. All around the large green pool, bodies of armored men laid around the dirt field, all with the same large holes in their necks, their crimson liquid pouring out from the gaping orifices. Zack shuddered, his gaze moving over to Roberto. The vice-president simply placed his hands in his duster, walking over the bodies as if they were large rocks. Zack walked around the corpses, the chains that were still connected to his shackles dragging along in the dirt.

Roberto led Zack to a large tower, with a single red door at the ground level. All over the giant brick-laid establishment were cross-like openings. Crosses. Religious like symbols from a not-so sought after belief. Roberto walked towards the wide red door, shoving the redwood open with both of his palms. The man sighed as he entered the building, Zack following his boss’ lead looking at yet another spiral staircase, though there was a bright blue light shining at the top where the spirals ended.

He looked towards the light, trying to figure out exactly what the source of the color was, when a strange sound diverted his focus back behind him. More armed guards, equipped with maces, swords, crossbows, and every other weapon imaginable, was charging at the two. Robert looked over his shoulder at the sight, a slight grin on his face as he turned and stepped in front of Zack. “You go on ahead Blaze. I wanna flex my muscles a little more.”

Zack hesitated for a moment, his gaze shifting back towards the staircase. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” Roberto said, stepping out of the tower and slowly walking towards the soldiers, his hands forming into drills once more. “Besides, I hate going up stairs.” Roberto turned for just a second, shutting the crimson door behind him. Zack could hear the screams of his victims through the walls, a slight pang of guilt in the man’s stomach.

“Now’s not the time to wait, Zack,” he said, closing his eyes, “I’m going to make sure Stern knows the hell he put me through…”

He quickly began to ascend the stairs, each one of his footsteps clinging against the steps thanks to the chains. It took several minutes of constantly running upwards in a spiral, but Zack had made it to the top, the sounds of Roberto and the guards fighting still echoing from outside. As Zack got closer to the blue light, he began to make out the image of what had appeared at first to be a mirror. Now that he had reached the top, he could see that it was a portal, an oval shape color of blue that rippled like a wave and showed an image of Kenneth Stern, viewing three other ripples as he watched with amusement.

Zack grinned a wide smile. Stern was sitting down, his back towards the portal Zack was about to enter. The other three could have only been the other finalists; the three that Stern had wanted to win. How unfortunate Zack’s mind bubbled with sadistic thoughts of torture, that they’re going to be greeted by me instead… Zack closed his eyes and stepped forward, his image disappearing into the water-like doorway.