KOV Round 2 - Battle 1: Overkill vs La Espada

INTERMISSION...

"Jesus Christ, look at this mess!" O'Reily examined the stunned body of the young Peter Matthews. Flash Fire's last ditch effort to stun the rampaging Titan was successful enough, though not enough for the powers behind this tournament to see him to the next round. His attack proved useful for the Coven staff members, as dealing with an unconscious body was a lot easier than dealing with a super powered man who has been mind controlled for the past two years into destroying and killing anything that was in the Coven's way, all of a sudden thrown back into control of his body and out of control with his devastating power set.

"The body, thank God, is in good shape. I guess that would be due to the demonic influence he just had. The armor will be expensive, as I'm sure you know, Lord Coven." He played with a broken piece of Overkill's now depowered and fragile armored suit until the piece fell off. O'Reily jumped a little when the sliver of black metal broke free from the rest of it's shell, blushing and looking at Alianette for a moment before hiding the piece under Peter's lifeless hand.

"You know I don't care about the price, just get him up and running for the next round. I want his armor back in one piece, fully loaded, and him fully charged. Then, I want you to make sure that we won't lose control of him again. Got it, O'Reily?" Lord Coven snapped at her tech-officer. She knew that this could have been a lot worse for them. Their weapon of mass destruction could have been lost to hell permanently.

O'Reily nodded quickly and began calling his team, doing his best to turn the mangled mess before him back into the Shield of the Coven.

3 DAYS LATER...

-RUNNING START UP PROGRAMS...

-LOADING....

-PROJECT OVERKILL: ONLINE-

The suit's eyes lit up, the fierce red glow that showed he was active. His head slowly panned from left to right, surveying his surroundings. He was standing on a platform, overlooking a large empty room. Scattered about the air were dozens of large pieces of shaped metal, floating slowly and casually bumping into each other. Beyond them, the walls were also metallic with metal bars, obviously meant to be hand holds. Large open windows showed him that they were on a space station of some kind, he could see the open black void of space and the occasional star in the distance. He could also see other parts of the space station. It was a large facility with several different sections, though he had no idea what they were for.

Finally, he saw a platform opposite his own. And on that platform was a man, approximately six feet tall, wielding an eight foot spear. No doubt, this was his opponent.

-FACIAL RECOGNITION COMPLETE-

-NAME: SANTIAGO PORTHOS

-ALIAS: LA ESPADA/THE BLACK VIPER

-SUMMARY: EXPERT COMBATANT WITH A SPEAR, QUANTUM COMPUTER BRAIN, SUPERHUMAN PHYSIOLOGY, HEMOKINESIS

Overkill read the notes and took every word to heart. Clearly, Peter was the heavy hitter, but he would never underestimate an opponent. Before he could look for appropriate battle strategies against the Black Viper, Peter saw an alert on his HUD.

-ALERT: LOW GRAVITY ENVIRONMENT-

-CURRENT GRAVITY: 0 TIMES NORMAL EARTH GRAVITY-

The game had gotten interesting. In a zero G environment, the Black-metal Brawler saw a clear advantage. Flight. Peter could actually maneuver in the air, rather well, where his opponent would have to push off of objects or walls to change his direction. As an apparent melee fighter, this would put Santi at a major disadvantage. Overkill would like to see how his opponent would adapt to this environment.

La Espada was a warrior, and Peter was programmed to show respect to those he fought. During his last fight, Flash Fire started the attack before Overkill could even attempt to offer him even a simple salute. Santi appeared to be more like a knight than anything else, so this would be a nice gesture. The Shield of the Coven stood up straight with his hands at his sides, then he bowed. A low bow was always the appropriate way to show respect to an opponent, though Peter never once took his eyes off of him. Upon returning to an upright position, Peter would place his right foot back and raise his hands in front of him like a boxer. After a brief moment, Overkill would nod to signal he was ready. If he received a nod in return, or his opponent went on the attack, the Titan of Power would take flight toward his enemy, ready to engage at any moment.

Round two... FIGHT!!!

Owing his partial but competent recovery from his previous battle to his accelerated regeneration, Santiago now found himself in a domain devoid of gravity. Believed to be no more than a traditional hand to hand combatant, he was at a seeming disadvantage. And while in possession of a wide variety of technology and equipment, most of which he was free to conjure, the Black Viper instead, opted not to. Adorned in his garments, onyx in shade, sharp in flair, the Spaniard hovered in midair, arms folded before his chest, an air of cool oozing from his every pore, and a swagger that was wicked and winsome dripped from the corners of his simple smirk. His features, exotic and of European charm, welcomed an expression of ease, of a calming confidence as his eyes of sapphire met and held those of his armored foe.

He said nothing, the Black Viper. Instead, he met his adversary's nod with a response that was simple, to the point, and clear; an inclination of the head that was both subtle and courteous. At the edges, his smirk twitched, and in this room of gray, absent gravity, and all manner of bizarre, floating objects, their bout commenced. His foe darted forward, radiated energy from whatever propulsion system he employed made closer his approach, and Santiago, ever the counter-fighter, sought to intercept. And he would do so by harnessing the power and versatility of his blood-bending. Commonly misunderstood to offer those who wield it the power to control and manipulate their adversary's blood, blood-bending in fact, granted the power to manipulate all of the body's fluids. And it was by combining this ability with his mind, pure in its knowledge of science, that Santiago forged himself into the deadliest of warriors.

He floated, unable to do much, and yet his hands moved, they were rigid and choppy, as if he were a puppeteer controlling a marionette that seemed invisible to the naked eye, and in fact, his marionette existed, for he sought to seize control of his opponent's cerebrospinal fluid, found in the brain and spine. If successful, the Black Viper would proceed, his hand movements growing more abrupt, faster by the second as he strained and made his attempts at decreasing, dramatically, the cerebrospinal fluid suspending the net mass of his adversary's brain. Why? The actual mass of the human brain is about 1,400 grams. When suspended in cerebrospinal fluid? 25 grams.

A stark difference that allowed the brain to exist in neutral buoyancy. Should Santiago succeed in draining the targeted quantity of his foe's cerebrospinal fluid, he would cause his opponent's brain to be impaired by its own mass and density, cutting off the blood supply and slaying the neurons responsible for transmitting information through the nervous system. It would render his foe an unconscious husk with a dysfunctional nervous system, and blood supply disrupted by the mass of his brain. And without the cerebrospinal fluid there to protect his opponent's brain tissue from forced contact with the skull, the Black Viper intended to capitalize.

By turning his body sideways, and extending his arm from the shoulder before bending his forearm inwards to smash, with superhuman power, the sharp point of his elbow into the right side of his opponent's skull, intent on ending the bout by causing brain injury and internal bleeding from his whipping elbow strike's goal of transferring its momentum, and smashing the brain against its skull's inner-walls.

-IMPACT IMMINENT-

The words flashed on the HUD for Project Overkill, a living power plant trapped inside a weapon of war designed to overcome any obstacle with tactical brute force. He flew at his opponent, expecting a mid-air collision with the Black Viper. Perhaps the more than capable melee fighter would accept his challenge and engage the Black-metal Brawler at point blank range. Overkill's systems had weighed the probability of him being successful in hand to spear combat and the result was 62% chance of victory, while the chances of a long range encounter would be roughly 65%. A long range tactic would be less energy efficient and if the battle were to drag out, he may start to run low on energy. The high chance of victory with melee combat being less costly seemed like the more acceptable plan of attack.

Suddenly, during his advance on his spear-wielding foe, immense pain began coursing though Peter's skull. He wobbled in flight for a moment before his forward thrust stopped, leaving him drifting towards Santiago Porthos. Peter had been able to see that Santi began making strange hand motions in his direction right before the pain began. Was this a spell? More magic being used against him?

-WARNING: CEREBROSPINAL FLUID LOSS IN BRAIN CAVITY-

The pain began to spread through his body, causing him to writhe around in the air. His eyes began to lose focus, barely being able to see the next message from his HUD.

-ANALYZING SOURCE...

-ATTACK ORIGIN: SANTIAGO PORTHOS [HEMOKINESIS]

-ERROR: TARGET [CEREROSPINAL FLUID] INVALID

-EDITING PROFILE [SANTIAGO PORTHOS]/REASON CODE: 15 [REDEFINED POWER/ABILITY]

-[HEMOKINESIS] HYDROKINESIS-

While Santi may not actually be able to control water, his system saw this as a more accurate definition so it edited the profile for now so Peter would have a better understanding of his opponent. Almost at the point of losing consciousness, La Espada had leaped toward him, intending to strike him in the head.

-WARNING: INCOMING ATTACK

-COUNTER INCOMING ATTACK [HEAD STRIKE]/BLOCK

-COUNTER INCOMING ATTACK [HYDROKINESIS]/LOSS OF FOCUS

Peter groaned, thinking of only one way to counter both attacks in the time he had before he was killed. With a loud roar of pain, he adjusted his body to face the Black Viper. He was experiencing tunnel vision, but putting Santi right in the middle of what he could see would hopefully be sufficient enough. He activated the central propulsion port located in the middle of his chest and released a large blast of energy. The attack delivered at such close range would at least knock Santi back and cause him to lose concentration on his blood bending attack. The force of the attack, if connected in the torso region where Peter was aiming, would send him flipping backward until he hit something solid. Though it probably wasn't enough to down the Black Viper, the kinetic impact wouldn't be a welcome feeling.

Once the blood bending attack was stopped, Peter would gasp for breath as fluid made it's way back into his skull. However, he would need time to recover from such an attack. Time that his system could provide for him.

-TARGET LOCKED: ACTIVATING MINIGUN TURRET-

His shoulder mounted minigun would aim at La Espada and open fire. Peter would not be making any big aerial maneuvers any time soon, so the attack would be intended on keeping his foe at a distance and focused on defending rather than causing Overkill the worst headache of the century. If the Black Viper took cover somewhere, the minigun would continue a suppressing fire on the location to try and keep his opponent pinned down. Wherever Santi ran, the energy based projectiles would try to follow.

If Peter could not get his brain responding correctly, however, this fight was already lost.

The elbow, a whipping strike, chained together with the Spaniard's hydrokinetic assault, sought to capitalize. It sought to transfer its momentum with authority, and command his foe's fluid-less brain to smash against the walls of its own skull. Gravity was absent, objects drifted all about like weightless traffic, and still Santiago struck like the Black Viper of infamy. And yet... he didn't? The elbow missed. Energy, sizzling and hungering for the destruction of man, poured from his foe's chest of metal and contemporary technology, and in a blast, was propelled into the Spaniard's gut, exposed from his commitment to the elbow strike of past. With one hand moving rigidly, its fingers following abruptly, and the other arm uncoiling the elbow strike, his torso knew no shield.

And the pit of his gut suffered for it. The blast's kinetic force struck him like a freight train and caused him to hunch. The pain, squeezing the air from him, was of enough shock to break his concentration on blood-bending. Then the heat of it, the blast. It superheated the matter on the surface of his gut, turning molecules to a scalding soup of organic goo that drifted across this weightless domain in lumps of red and orange. The blast burned hot, so hot that it felt cold. Layers upon layers of his flesh were being peeled away, either burned to scorching dust or melted into plasma. Even then, Santiago smirked, his features of cool, of exotic swagger holding, still, an expression of confidence. His thought, "The nino's good. That he is. But I am better". He certainly felt so.

Propelled into acceleration by the blast's kinetic energy, Santiago's body, wounded and burned, drifted, and alongside him? The singed remnants of his ebony garments. And in accordance to Newton's Laws, an object in motion remained so unless stopped by a force. With no gravity, and no means of self-propulsion, the Black Viper's motion was stopped only by impact; his back crashing against a drifting box of gray. Old wounds from molten rock reopened, and new ones burned into his flesh by a blast, Santiago struggled, allowing himself microseconds of recuperation until his opponent attacked again. And attack he did. This time however, with kinetic bombardment. He commended his foe's approach, Santiago. Its tactical purpose was sound. He would force the Spaniard into defense.

And if all one does is defend and react, eventually will come the time when they react incorrectly, and in a bout of this kind, such a reaction could prove fatal. "I'm too suave to die", winced the Black Viper, his lips never far from a smirk. Allowing his fast-acting regeneration to heal what it could, Santiago too acted with speed, reaching for a handle on the object's opposite side. There he took cover from the hailstorm of projectiles, recomposed himself and attacked. The cerebrospinal fluid had returned to his opponent's cranium. Even then, his foe's brain remained injured. Santiago sought to capitalize, on both the brain's wounded state, and his opponent's insistence on retaining the fluid that suspended his body's most important organ. How? One of two trump-cards. Blood-bending.

His hands moved again, abrupt and rigid, fast and choppy. They no longer sought to drain, no instead they now sought to boil the cerebrospinal fluid. And should he succeed, the once bushy neurons would be emasculated of their branches leaves as the fluid would boil and its temperature rise with no ceiling. It would boil so hot it would seek to vibrate the brain's molecules faster and cause them to move farther apart. And once at a standard pressure, his foe's brain, once solid, would succumb to the boiling cerebrospinal fluid, reach its melting point and begin its transition into a liquid. The Spaniard sought not to simply boil the brain. He sought to shut it down and either turn it into a soup of boiling, organic goo, or completely evaporate the cerebrospinal fluid that he boiled without restraint.

His vision was blurred, but slowly returning to normal. Panting heavily, Peter Matthews slowly began regaining his composure. His energy powered minigun had his opponent pinned down behind one of the floating structures that filled this room without gravity. This wouldn't make him win though, he would need another attack.

As he began coming up with a possible attack, he felt another unimaginable pain inside his skull. Another roar of pain as more warnings flashed in front of his eyes.

-WARNING: TEMPERATURE IN BRAIN CAVITY INCREASING-

It was unpleasant to say the least. The rising temperature in his head caused a lot of pain, but this blood-bending attack was a little less effective than the last. Peter Matthews was a living battery, a power plant for this volatile energy that he used daily. While his body created the energy naturally with everyday activities like eating or sleeping, everything that would figuratively recharge a normal person's batteries, Peter could also absorb other sources of energy and convert it into his own energy. Many different types of energy can be taken in this way. Commonly, electricity and light are absorbed, however, during his last fight it was hellfire which had unpredictable results. Santi's attack? He was literally creating heat energy inside Peter's head.

Every time that the Black Viper raised the amount of heat energy in Peter's brain cavity, the Shield of the Coven would absorb that energy. This is not to say that the attack was futile. Overkill was experiencing part two of the world's worst headache now, and he was not happy about it. The feeling of your brain almost coming to a boil every moment was like being perpetually on the edge of death. Extreme pain, and something else that he wasn't accustom to. Anger.

Peter looked where his opponent was still hiding, the glowing eyes in his mask growing a little brighter. He quickly sent a command to his suit. The Coven thought that letting Peter talk, even with mind control, would be too much freedom and might allow disobedience.

-SPEECH INHIBITING PROGRAM: DEACTIVATED

-FREE SPEECH ENABLED-

"I'm getting really tired of people inside my head. URGH! Just ask Flash Fire." Speaking through his grunts of pain, this perhaps gave his opponent time to move, but he didn't care. Overkill flew forward, pulling his fist back before throwing a punch that would collapse a ten story building at La Espada's floating cover. The impact would send the object flying toward the wall of the battleground, possibly with Santi between the two. In his current position, the Coven's Black Knight had another of the large metal blocks floating to his left. After the impact, Peter would float left and grab the object by its hand hold, spin it around his body, and throw it at wherever he saw his opponent next. With a name like 'Overkill' it has to be overly aggressive.

Finally, his opponent spoke, and alongside his words was a timbre of anger. Back braced against a surface, his fingers coiled around the handle of this large, gray cube of metal enormity, Santiago's assault ended with a pant. Instead, his energies were to focus on accelerating a regeneration that was the envy of many a fast healer. His breathing slowed, his chest no longer rose like a voluminous wave of water, and the flesh of his gut, peeled away by energies too hot and excited, was on path to restoration. And despite an ever-present smirk, of defiant flair perhaps, the ordeal was painful. The feeling of one's flesh, muscle fibers and tissues regrowing and reattaching at a rate beyond normality?

Only the Black Viper could endure this brand of agony with an expression too cocky for most. Then, then came the attack of an overzealous foe. In a place of absent gravity, there was no quick shift in airflow for the Spaniard's dermis to sense. His dermis instead, was made to know pain. The impact was powerful, and with it came kinetic force.. and a shock-wave. The energy, kinetic in origin, made every iota of it felt as the drifting cube shattered under a might that could bring down the contemporary man's towers. Its broken fragments, sharpened edges were superheated. By what? The shock-wave which in a weightless domain, was an ever expanding ring of gases too hot for the mortal man to bear.

The debris, accelerated by the impact's momentum, were flung in every direction, unchallenged. Some missed, but some? Some shredded the Black Viper's flesh, singed his garments of black, and left him the victim of a hailstorm. One that with the fury of sharp and scorching debris, lacerated his skin, burned those cuts with no concept of mercy, and singed, scratched and clattered against the thick, glass walls of their domain. And it was, once collecting and re-positioning himself, those very walls, against which Santiago braced the soles of his feet, bent at the knees and with every muscle fiber that twitched with his innate, superhuman might, propelled himself forward. His eyes, sharp and of sapphire blue, held in their sight, the large metal cube hurled in his direction.

Quickly, his spear, Venenoso, materialized, and his fingers coiled readily around the shaft. With his front hand, he balanced the weapon, and with his back-hand, he controlled and guided. The spearhead, forged from an experimental steel-obsidian alloy, was extraordinarily durable. And not solely from its composition, but because of the quantum shields that lock its subatomic structure into place, offering it a structural strength and thermal stability that knew no equal. And blessed with cubic-boron nitride-dispersed edges, it could pierce through virtually anything. Driving his arms forward, the grip of his front hand loosened, allowing the spear's shaft to pass through it, all while his rear hand pushed forward until both hands met, his arms were fully extended, and the thrust drove the spearhead into the cube's internal structure.

It was then that by virtue of his considerable strength, the Black Viper did away with the cube's momentum, jerking his arms forward and sending the object drifting into the distance. The lack of gravity hindered his fighting prowess. Without it, there were no weak angles from his foe he could attack. There were no strong planes for him to stand on, and without the pull of gravity, there was no weight behind his strikes. While the applications for blood-bending were endless, Santiago, wounded and knowing of his foe's almost supernatural resilience, selected his deadliest trump-card; quantum telepathy. With it he held at his disposal, the power to manipulate the quantum/physical information that comprises the consciousness of others. And with it, he sought to bring a swift and quick end to a strenuous bout.

How? By hoping to transfer all of the physical information that constituted his opponent's consciousness/mind from his body to space-time geometry; an effect that would essentially strip his foe's body of its mind by exiling the armored juggernaut's consciousness to a domain that was primordial and understood by few. It would, if successful, render his adversary's body an empty, inactive husk of nothing. No mind. No self.

His powerful right hand did better than knock La Espada's cover across the room, it shattered it completely. Either Peter hit it harder than he wanted to, or it was a lot more frail than Peter had thought. Santi was hit by various shrapnel and sent toward the wall. Overkill's next attack was not as successful as he threw the second large metal cube at the Black Viper. He was agitated that his spear wielding foe was able to destroy the incoming attack with a powerful spear thrust.

Overkill's systems began compiling data to suggest his next attack. He thought that a short range attack would be the better option as this long range battle just made him more of a target for Santi's blood-bending. Overkill began an advance toward his opponent. Not speeding out of control, but he was closing the distance quickly. He thought about engaging his enemy, deflecting a spear thrust with his left gauntlet and connecting a right hook to Santi's jaw. He thought about the bones cracking, his flesh warping around his black-metal fist, his head snapping back in recoil before his body floated lifelessly across the zero gravity environment and into the wall. And then... He thought nothing.

Peter's body went limp, his glowing eye slits fading to black. The black suit of armor slowed and drifted into some debris. The Black Viper was successful. Project Overkill's mind had vanished. The body slowly floated right past Santiago Porthos and made no movements. Santi looked upon the brain dead body of Peter Matthews with surprise. He had done it. He had wiped clear the mind of his foe leaving a human body that only used the involuntary muscle contractions that it did not need it's mind for. Breathing, heartbeat, blinking, everything that your body does without you thinking about it. That was the only sign of life inside the armored shell...

INSIDE THE SUBCONSCIOUS OF PETER MATTHEWS...

The familiar scene that was the only one that the real Peter knew. A large dark room, cables all over the floor leading to a large, black, egg-shaped cell made of infraglium. A small computer to the left side of it. The only person in the room looked like Peter, but it was far from it. This was the personality that the Coven wished to be in control of Peter's body. The mind that was implanted into him for their gain. He stood at attention, guarding the cell behind him which was where Peter Matthew's really was.

Suddenly, Peter grabbed his head and grunted in pain, then all at once, froze in place. Slowly, the body that was the mental representation of this form of Peter, began to dissolve. Clothing, hair, skin, muscle, organs, and finally bone. All disappearing piece by piece until... Nothing.

When this version of Peter had fully disappeared, all of the technology in the room seemed to slowly lose power. The glow of computer monitors faded, various instruments and gauges slowly fell to zero. The light hum of motors and generators got quieter until there was a numbing silence in the room. As time passed, one sound was slowly getting louder and louder. A low, rhythmic thumping. Originating from inside the cell. Two abrupt bangs broke the silence. The thunderous sound of restraints being broken for the first time. A massive explosion as one side of the black metal egg was blown out. Metal clashed and slid across the floor, sparks flying all around. A small amount of smoke came from inside the cell and floated upward into darkness. And from inside the cell came a new quiet sound. Deep breathing.

"Finally..."

NOW...

Eyes suddenly lit up once more, followed by a large gasp of air. "F***!!!" Abruptly springing back to life, Peter cried out in pain and grabbed his head. Where the Coven had controlled his mind to ignore most pain, Peter was now feeling the after effects of having his cerebrospinal fluid drained and then almost boiled. And he hated it.

Santi was successful in his attack, he removed the mind from Peter's body. It just wasn't the only mind in Peter's head. Santi may have done Peter a favor... If he lets Peter live.

"Where am I?! What is-?! Get this crap off of me!" He began tearing at his helmet, eventually breaking the restraints and ripping it off, tossing it to the side. His face was panicked and sweaty. Peter spent over a year in that cell before being trapped in the same cell in his own mind. This resulted in a dramatic case of claustrophobia. Wearing a fully encased helmet and suit was not something he enjoyed at the moment. He tore the entire suit of armor off, casting its pieces about the room. Now completely naked, he began to calm down. Sadly, it wasn't until now that he was composed enough to realize that he was floating at least fifteen feet above the ground.

"What the...? Am I...?" He looked up, seeing the window and space beyond it. Stars and space ships scattered in the picture. "I'm in space??" He turned and saw an unknown man. He was some kind of latino decent, Peter guessed, and holding a long spear. A spear... With a distinctly black metal head.

"What the hell is that?! Is that this sh**?!" He pointed to the infraglium helmet, a metal that (in certain forms) could forcibly drain his energy from him. The same metal that was his prison for so long. The young man became infuriated. "You work for them!! I'm not going back! I WONT!!!"

Peter's mind remembered his past escape attempts. Every time he broke free, there was always Coven security forces equipped with infraglium weapons that were used to control him. Usually they were chains to contain him, or blunt weapons to try and knock him out. A spear was unique. Now he thought about the moments during the fight with Flash Fire and how he also had a unique weapon. Was that also made of infraglium? Peter was playing tricks on his own memory, creating things that weren't there. Like how Santiago Porthos was definitely working for the Coven.

"I'LL F***ING KILL YOU!!!" Peter raised his hands in the direction of his attacker. The one thing that he remembered from his escape attempts was that he could release the energy like opening a valve. Not control, but point and shoot. He opened the 'valves' on his palms and red energy shot outward at the Black Viper. The force from the blast sent Peter backward into the wall behind him. He grunted, then looked back at it. He was no tactical genius, but he knew that in a zero gravity environment, he would need to push off of solid objects in whatever direction he needed to go. He grabbed one of the hand holds on the wall and planted his feet as well. He pulled upward hard, removing the entire panel from the wall. The force also sent him towards Santi, quicker than he wanted maybe.

Peter knew a little about history and weapons. This guy's spear had a snake skin hanging off of it that Peter mistook for a piece of fabric. He knew that martial artists would use this trick when their weapon moved too fast for them to track with their eyes. The fabric would create a sound as it moved through the air that the user would track. This man would be quick and agile in his attacks. Peter would use the panel as a shield, lifting it up to his shoulder and covering his head and torso. He held it at an angle. If he held it directly toward La Espada, he might be able to pierce right through it with enough force. Angling his shield would cause the force to deflect off of the metal rather than connect head on.

Once the attack was deflected, Peter would come out from behind his shield and quickly throwing a right hook toward Santi's head. He would have to attack quickly as his momentum would carry him away from his target. As he floated away, he would try to spin and place the shield between himself and the Black Viper to defend any counter attacks.

"I'M NO SLAVE!!!"

He remained aware, the Black Viper. His eyes of sapphire, sharp and focused, ever observant of the lifeless husk before him as they both drifted without aim, without the force of gravity there to anchor them to a surface. Shattered glass and scorched debris whisked all about them, slow and lethargic, lacking in momentum. Half-destroyed cubes and their singed remnants seemed the only other occupants of this room that hung in the expanse of space. Lowering his gaze for but a moment, fingers coiled tightly around the shaft of his spear, Santiago gazed upon a sight that was nothing short of breathtaking, an image that had inspired wonderment in those great men and women privileged enough to have soared beyond their homeworld's reach.

Made clear by transparent, scratched glass that walled them, were first the stars, twinkling quietly in this background of blackness, the moon, hanging far at a distance, and then below them, the Earth. It was mesmeric. A large, blue oasis in the vastness of space. And the Spaniard smiled as he saw the clouds in his planet's atmosphere, swirling, the shimmering lights made possible by man's discovery of electricity, the continents, they all came together in a perfect blend, a sight of such singular beauty that it threatened to derail the Black Viper's focus from the bout at hand. And truth be told, it had. It was only his back bumping against a wall, and the shout of a homicidal promise from a returning foe that made his heartbeat skip, nay... leap, and his gaze widen.

There floated his adversary, a distance from him, the singed remnants of all things destroyed in their clash swirling around him in a slow, directionless stir. He was bare this warrior, stripped of his own armor by virtue of his own actions. How he had returned, Santiago did not know. The Spaniard knew not of the two minds that had ran rampant in his opponent's cranium, and certainly not that he'd only banished one of two from a man he now recognized as surprisingly unique in a world where men and women were born with the most outlandish genes. His wounds pained him still. His lacerations burned, his bruises ached, and his scorched patches of skin remained as black as night. "Perhaps that should have been your original game-plan, mano", the Black Viper taunted in the face of a murderous shout.

This bout, every attack launched, it had been a narrative, a story revolving around the Spaniard's foe. Around his foe's resilience, and ability to withstand and endure. The story asked the question, how much more can this man take? And in the face of this adversity, will he crumble like many before him, or will he be forged by the fires of harshness and persevere? Santiago was eager to know. The battle itself resumed with a blast. He could feel the air grow hot, and his face tighten from the heat of a blast that roared its approach. Near the wall, Santiago reached for a neighboring handle and pulled himself from the blast's range, not however, before it swallowed his lower legs, superheated his flesh, boiled away the moisture on his skin, and nearly peeled his tissues down and reach bone. Recuperation however, was short-lived.

His opponent was on the offensive, propelling towards him, and with a thud, rammed the hard edge of an improvised shield into the Spaniard's gut, cracking behind Santiago the wall of glass, and forcing a well of blood to gush from his mouth as internal organs cried and he winced. But then, then as his foe sought to pile on the assault with a hook, the Black Viper struck, and again with his quantum-telepathy. With it, he sought to manipulate the physical information that comprised his foe's consciousness and telepathically command him to halt his attempted right hook, and move drop his improvised shield so that he expose his entire torso to the Black Viper's ensued attack. Spear in hand, the Spaniard slid his front hand toward the spearhead, all while pulling to the rear with his back-hand, enabling him to slide the shaft through his back-hand as he swung the weapon in an upwards arc.

One that sought to, with its cubic-boron nitride-dispersed edges, slice into his opponent's exposed pectoral. No more than a minor cut. Why? Because the true danger lied in an unseen threat. In the moment of the cut, should it come, the spearhead's edges would transfer microscopic capsules into the opponent's body, micro-capsules that would then release a cluster of harmful neurotoxins, all of them, atracotoxin. And unlike most neurotoxins that worked by shutting down the nervous system in some manner, atracotoxin instead hyper-stimulates the nervous system to the point of overload.

In his foe's body, the neurotoxin would seek to increase the body's pain response, induce pulmonary edema by bursting the millions of air sacs in the lungs, essentially causing the victim to drown when on dry land, and in this case, in a zero-gravity room, painful circulatory failure, shortness of breath, involuntary contractions and relaxation of one's muscles, nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting. Santiago was wounded, severely so, should his adversary find the means to survive again, he would need true inspiration for his next and final attack.

Rage. Fear. Will. Desperation. Peter had only one objective. He would do anything so the Coven wouldn't take him back. His energy blast had met its mark, scorching his opponent's legs. After ripping his would-be shield from the wall, Peter's next move had done more damage than intended. Meant as a block, Peter launched himself toward La Espada with his shield raised, intending to block any incoming spear attacks. Instead, the shield connected with Santi's torso, resulting in an expulsion of blood from his mouth. The blunt impact against the glass behind the Black Viper caused it to crack. This glass was tempered and tested to survive great force to make it nearly impossible to break and destroy the barrier between the safety of this ship and the dangers of the void of space. And the Blood-red Brawler had cracked it on accident.

Peter didn't want to let up. He didn't want to give his opponent the chance to rebound and swing the fight in his favor. If a block had done this much damage to his target, a direct hit would surely finish him. Peter clenched his fist and raised it, energy coursing though his muscles and empowering him. The next blow would be able to flatten most vehicles completely. Peter was counting on what that kind of force would do to the human jawbone. But, he had stopped. From out of nowhere, he decided to not throw his hand forward and decimate his adversary. The battle was his to win. His opponent's life was in his hands, and he was going to hand it back? Why? He felt no remorse for this dog of the Coven. It was almost as if he had no reason to stop the attack other than he just decided to. He was also perplexed at his own decision to lower the metal panel that was his shield. He didn't want to give up, but why did it seem like that's what he was doing?

He looked up from his shield and saw his opponent readying his next attack, a swinging attack with his spear aimed at Peter's upper torso. He may have decided to halt his attack and lower his defense a moment ago, but he still didn't want to die. He reacted as quickly as he could, trying to turn his body to avoid the attack. Untrained muscles coupled with sheer panic was a terrible combination.

"RRAAAAAAAGHHHHHH!!!!" Peter screamed in agony. His opponent meant to cut skin, but as Peter failed to dodge correctly, the attack was more than Santi had hoped for. Turning his body the wrong way, Peter accidentally caused the spearhead to impale him directly through his right shoulder. His arm went limp as his left hand gripped the shaft. His eyes were clenched shut as he held his breath, his body shaking from the pain. After a few seconds of deep breaths, his eyes opened, looking right past Santi. They looked beyond his opponent, past the cracked glass behind him, and into the vastness of outer space. He began breathing heavier... Tears dripping down his cheeks.

"It's... Beautiful... All of that open space... Solar systems, untouched by human hands... It's freedom." He felt short of breath, his panting increased. "That's all I want... I..." He gasped for air a few times before continuing. "I want to be free. I-I can't go back to that cage. Not after everything they made me do..." Peter cried a little harder for a moment, finally regaining his composure with heartache in his eyes. "I-... I've killed people... I've killed so... Many people... Fathers, sons, husbands... Wives, mothers... I... Couldn't stop myself... It was like watching a movie-hngh!!" Another wince of pain. It was at this moment that Santiago Porthos would realize, this man wasn't in this competition for some all powerful wish. He was a pawn for someone else's gain. "... I can't go back to that..." He felt nauseous. His lungs hurt, breathing was difficult. His arms and legs kept shaking and jerking around occasionally. His body was failing. He took another deep breath and looked Santi in the eyes, shaking his head slowly.

"I'm sorry... I wont go back.... I wont." He grit his teeth and looked just over Santi's shoulder at the cracked glass. Peter then let loose a blast of energy from his eyes and completely shattered the glass. Immediately, with all the strength he could muster while his body was shutting down, Peter would roar in pain and rip the spear from his body, removing Santi's anchor to him as explosive decompression began pulling all of the air inside the ship and anything it happened to be carrying out into space.

Peter didn't wait to see if La Espada would latch onto something or be cast out into the void. He knew he wouldn't have time for that. He turned his body and let loose a large, continuous blast of energy from his feet and hands, flying back into the ship. It was difficult, flying against an air current that strong, but Peter kept going. The large metal obstacles began hurtling toward the opening in the hull. His muscles tightened involuntarily and he yelped in pain, breaking his flight for a moment. He flew to the side, then back again, trying to dodge the massive projectiles on their way to space. Another was headed right for him, he knew he wouldn't be able to dodge it. A large blast of energy from his eyes was enough to break it into smaller pieces. Pieces that became shrapnel. Shrapnel that dug into his flesh repeatedly. More roars of pain and a muscle spasm, Peter curled into the fetal position and began floating back towards space.

He couldn't die here. His body was dying and he was being sucked out into space. He heard alarms, safety protocols being voiced over an intercom. A ship of this size had safety measures in case something like this happened. He was able to see large metal panels sliding out of the walls around the windows, containment for a hull breach. That's all he needed, to stay in the ship. He was running on pure willpower now, the absolute strength from his fear of going back to the Coven. It would give him strength he didn't know he had. He screamed again in pain as he released even more energy, trying to push his body to the inside of the breach before it closed. His energy was being used quickly, he'd never released this much energy at one time before. It was a necessary evil, as the alternative was floating into space.

With a loud slam, the doors locked tightly behind him, the rush of air ceased and all of that propulsion now had no resistance. His body soared across the room, hitting one of the large metal cubes that managed to survive. An impact which slowed his speed enough to make hitting the wall behind it unpleasant instead of deadly. Still, he cried out in pain. The neurotoxin was still doing it's work in his body. He didn't have much time left. And yet, he may have had even less time.

Where did the spear guy go?

"Mi hermano", began the Black Viper, his breaths labored, his body aching from the rigors of battle, "I am not with-", words uttered a second too late it seemed, for his opponent had done the unthinkable. Doomed them both. His gaze widened, and those liquid, sapphire eyes spoke, expressed his immediate sentiment. "Why my naked fool?", Santiago sighed, his mouth edging closer to a frown, features once suave, now held in earnest an expression of cold intensity. Fingers coiled around a handle on the wall, the Spaniard's grip tightened, and fervently, this weightless battleground collapsed. By the will of a blast, its exterior was compromised, and with a pace that was ever so quickening, the interior depressurized.

And everything, the cubes, drifting shrapnel, his foe's armor, the singed parts of the Spaniard's garments, it was all sucked out into the cold and black vacuum of space. Air that had once served as a medium for both their survival, expanded outward, pulling with it everything. He was fortunate, the Black Viper, that he clung to something on the wall. But his grip was slipping. No amount of superhuman contractile muscle tissues could defy nature's will. He felt his joints stretching beyond their boundaries. His tendons tearing and shredding violently, skin stretching and the air escaping his lungs. The debris that flied so wildly, missed him by an inch. He fought, Santiago. Fought for his life. A stubborn willingness to survive beating strong alongside his heart.

The vacuum of space? His graveyard would not be shared with broken asteroids and the remains of celestial bodies. Even he didn't drip with the swagger, the suavity to survive in a void so cold and cruel. Space was where, without the presence of Earth's atmospheric pressure, the water that comprises up to 70% of one's body no longer remains in liquid state and instead expands until it forms water vapor. It was where internal swelling reached a severity impossible in the confines of a planet. It was where the human body ballooned to twice its size. It was where without a layer of ozone to shield against ultraviolet rays, the power of the sun would leave the body scorched, and the retinas melted.

It was where without atmospheric pressure, the oxygen in the bloodstream dissolved and escaped, disabling cardiovascular systems, and depriving muscles and vital organs of a fundamental element. Where man suffocated and skin turned blue. The human body would be, internally and externally, stretched, ballooned, and contorted. Where a victim's misshapen body would struggled to maintain normal blood pressure. Where the heart failed to pump blood through what would be enlarged veins. It was a low pressure environment, outer space. And the lower the pressure of a domain, the lower the boiling point for any liquid in that domain. Why? With less pressure, molecules are free to move around, requiring less heat to be transformed from a liquid to a gas. It was why in space, blood in the body boiled.

He didn't intend to die like this, to perish in this manner. Even as the vacuum pulled with all its might, Santiago remained stubborn. Quickly, this battle had been twisted and turned into a tale of freedom for one, and survival for another. The Black Viper lived his life indulging in what he pleased, challenging anyone and everyone, he would die on his own terms, not another's. A lump then thickened in his throat, and in that moment, he knew sorrow. His foe, would he die with the memory that the man he fought, a lusty charmer, was in league with those who imprisoned, tortured and maimed his mind? Broke his spirit? He pitied this man's past, Santiago.

But beyond that, he respected his foe's decision to die not from a poisonous spear, but on his own terms, by his own hand. And before seizing the quantum information that comprised his own consciousness and jumping into space-time geometry as a sort of quantum soul, the Black Viper vowed then and there. "Win or lose, my friend. I will see you again. And I will free you". And like his foe, so too did the Spaniard disappear. Survival in his mind, but a promise in his heart.