[IC] TTG Final: Nil

[Shamitako]

What was supposed to be a long journey had turned out to be mere moments, or at least it felt that way. Hiroki now found herself in a completely empty black room. She couldn't make out the dimensions with her eyes, but her instincts told her it was square, and a good deal smaller than the arena she had occupied before coming here. Cardinal didn't seem to be here, but Hiroki could tell that she was in the right place. This tiny pocket of blackness tucked away in the corner of reality was the Plane of Nil. It was rather pitiful, really, this little box was the great danger they had all been fighting to stop.

 

A window appeared beside her, or maybe it had always been there and she just hadn't been able to see it until now. Through this window Hiroki could see a place unlike any she had ever known. It was another room, one covered from head to toe with strange containers, bags, books, and toys. At one end of the room a girl with long, unkempt black hair was sitting at a computer, wearing an oversize t-shirt and no pants. Hiroki couldn't see what she was doing at this angle, but the girl seemed totally engrossed.

 

"You got here fast." Hiroki saw the girl's lips move, but the voice came from behind her. When she turned to look, she found the girl again, but this time in a much more recognizable form. Cardinal, dressed in an unusual black and white dress, her hair now neatly combed. Although she was a good bit taller than Hiroki, something about the girl seemed very small. It wasn't merely her slight frame either, this girl was nothing like the other gods, let alone Arcturus or Watcher. All of the other powerful entities Hiroki had stood against had exerted their power through their mere presence. Yet compared to her, this girl seemed insignificant. Again, Hiroki had to wonder how such a pitiful thing could be a the great threat she had been training to fight. Even having seen Cardinal in action, she couldn't help but question if there had been some mistake.

 

"You're here to stop me, right?" Cardinal sounded afraid, and visibly seemed to shrink back, "Well, I don't plan to back down, so don't think you can intimidate me. I'm not going to lose, because I don't have anything to lose." Cardinal seemed to brace herself for combat, but made no move to attack or even summon her defenses.

[Chevaleresse]

"You can't win,"Hiroki replied, trying to sound more certain than she really was.  I have nothing except for this. Nil wasn't exactly what she'd expected. The lack of features, she could have guessed at, but she had expected it to be more. . . offensive to the senses. It was something that shouldn't exist. "But. . . I don't want, um, to fight you." Arcturus had said to do the opposite of what Watcher wanted. She still didn't really know why she was trusting one enigma over the other, though one hadn't decided to yank her soul out for a moment just to prove a point. Perhaps Arcturus was just a kindred spirit, in a way. "Watcher brought me, um here, to defeat you." She waited to see how Cardinal would react to that; the False God was obeying Watcher for some reason, maybe she would relent - or at least be put off balance for a fight, if it broke out - if she believed Hiroki.

[Shamitako]

Cardinal shrank back even further in the face of Hiroki's confidence. It may have been bluster, but Cardinal was clearly not equipped to notice. Which is why she was so confused by Hiroki's following statements. It took her a while to sort through just what Hiroki had said. But unfortunately, Hiroki's words were not beyond Cardinal's capacity to rationalize. "Of course he did, he sent you here." she said, her voice still quivering, "He sent you here so I can beat you, and by beating you I can finally be recognized by the Planes. So I don't care if you want to fight, we're going to fight." She didn't sound entirely like she'd convinced herself, seeing as she still hadn't attacked, but she also hadn't backed down. It didn't seem like a diplomatic solution was possible yet.

[Chevaleresse]

"He told me he sent, um, me to beat you." Hiroki thought for a moment. "I know you don't have, um, any reason to believe what I'm saying. But I asked him why he started all this, and he said. . ." She ran over it in her head once again, to make sure she got it right. "'I have already succeeded as the destroyer, and I wish to create a hero to undo my actions.'" She took a breath, trying to remain steady. She found herself unafraid of the upcoming fight, but trying to prevent it, negotiating with someone and convincing them to trust her. . . well, she hadn't even managed to do that with herself until today. "He said, 'Cardinal trusts me, I'm like a father to her, but I have every intent to betray her." Hiroki glanced down and away. She'd never exactly been close to her own father, but she knew what betrayal felt like. I wonder what happened to her. . . "I'm sorry."

[Shamitako]

Cardinal seemed dumbfounded. "Undo? He can't do that." she mumbled, "That's against the rules." She became so lost in thought that it almost seemed like she had forgotten Hiroki was there. And when she finally came out of it, she was different. "It doesn't matter." she said firmly, "Whatever Lucifer is up to, I will deal with it later. Here and now, you are my obstacle. I will defeat you, I will escape, and I will beat him too. The one thing I will not do is surrender, not when I'm so close."

 

Cardinal motioned upwards with her arms, causing a pitch black sphere to surround her in her entirety. It was so dark that it was now impossible to see her against the equally dark world they occupied. She didn't wait for Hiroki to be ready, a  chunk of nothingness broke away from the rest and flew towards Hiroki. She had already seen what Cardinal's attacks could do, now she would have to find a way to overcome them.

[Chevaleresse]

Cardinal had made her intentions clear; her opponent was ready. Hiroki dove sideways as soon as the darkness rose, calling her mech to her and using the momentum to keep moving quickly. The machine coalesced into a defiant star in the darkness, thrusters and guns lighting up in unison and launching a sheet of rippling fire into the void. "Cardinal, stop!" Despite her calls, she had the full intention of fighting as hard as she could until the False God made it clear that she wasn't going to continue attacking. "You don't have to take me out to beat him!" She continued to cast a wide net with her fire, saturating the darkness around Hiroki with bolts of plasma. 

[Shamitako]

Cardinal wasn't listening anymore, she had made up her mind to fight, there would be no stopping her unless something drastic happened. Hiroki's fire was effortlessly absorbed by her barrier, but at least watching where the fire vanished gave Hiroki a decent idea of where Cardinal was. Which is why it was a bit of a surprise when it stopped vanishing entirely. Hiroki had only a moment to process what had happened before a burst of agony washed over her from above. Cardinal had fired a chunk of displaced space through the Hellfire Knight, damaging it and disrupting its systems, as well as creating a great deal of pain as it passed through Hiroki herself.

[Chevaleresse]

Hiroki nearly bit her tongue gritting her teeth. Those rifts hurt, and the number of HUD lights that went dark as it passed through her was less than comforting. Even more worrying, Cardinal didn't seem to be taking any damage. Now, though, at least she knew to watch for teleportation. It was problematic, especially since the way she did it suggested it wasn't exactly a restricted ability, as it meant her strategy of corralling an opponent until they had no options left besides taking fire would be far less effective. Still, she could make adjustments. 

 

Despite a brief protest from the targeting computer, she adjusted the systems to fire more evenly in a dome shape around her, arranging her shots to illuminate as much of the area as possible as she continued to strafe. Dodging unfortunately wasn't going to be much of an option, but she began to accelerate in a curve anyway. "Set priority sectoring to 50% of volume, 10 degree arc. Set priority criteria to lowest illumination." A small popup appeared as she fired off instructions to her system; it wasn't something it was pre-configured for and therefore it requested confirmation, which she granted. The guns shifted about, automatically redistributing their aiming arcs to focus on the darkest areas - hopefully, Cardinal's position. Additionally, she prepared for another attack; it had a slim chance of working, but it could reveal more information about her foe.  

 

Hiroki watched and waited for Cardinal to move again. When she did, she'd swing her main cannon about and fire a full-power blast into whatever Cardinal attacked with.

[Shamitako]

Hiroki's attack was successful in revealing Cardinal's position, but Cardinal's response to this was not at all what she expected. Instead of teleporting and attacking the wy she had before, Cardinal fired off a quick volley of three blasts, moving to the side with each. This created a wall of darkness that approached through Hiroki's attack and concealed the precise location of Cardinal behind them. It was an unexpectedly cautious move after her aggressive opening.

[Chevaleresse]

Hiroki set both feet of the Knight down, skidding to a halt. She wouldn't be able to redirect, but if Cardinal had targeted her at all intelligently, those voids would be traveling into her path, not at her. She started to move in the opposite direction regardless, continuing to apply pressure to Cardinal and hopefully getting a clear line of sight to Cardinal's. . . It didn't act much like a mech, but that's what she'd have to call it. There was no defense that couldn't be worn down, and so Hiroki continued to try to do so, saturating the area around the False God with plasma. Her main cannon lanced out with a moderately-powered beam headed for where all the light seemed to be vanishing, Hiroki still poised to spin in place and target Cardinal if she teleported again.

[Shamitako]

Cardinal reached through reality, glimpsing a few moments into the future. In a span of time too small to count, she had learned all that Hiroki planned to do in the following seconds, perhaps even before the Hellfire Knight knew herself. Her power did not only reveal Hiroki's actions, but also the ones for her to take to achieve success. Over long periods it might fall apart, but in the short term it was infallible. Or at least it ought to have been. For although Cardinal knew exactly what Hiroki was doing, her paradox had found no path to victory. She was clearly stronger, yet she was being overwhelmed so easily with no way to turn things around. Was this the end?

 

No.

 

Watcher had promised. He had promised her that she would not fail. She was going to win her freedom, no matter what it took.

 

Cardinal teleported above Hiroki again, but Hiroki didn't have a chance to respond as she intended to. The world flashed bright white around the battle for just a moment as Cardinal activated her signature, causing both of their mechs to totally vanish. They fell to the ground with Cardinal landing atop Hiroki, pinning the smaller girl down with her weight. But victory wouldn't come from just halting the fight, Cardinal had to stop Hiroki for good. Her delicate fingers wrapped around Hiroki's neck as she attempted to strangle her foe. Her heart was pounding in her throat and her eyes wide with panicked fear as she tried to hold back tears. She felt sick, but she didn't stop. No matter what it takes, she told herself in Watcher's voice. If Cardinal didn't have the courage to do this, then the Prince of Nothing would have to.

[Chevaleresse]

Somewhat fortunately for Hiroki, her startled gasp as her mech vanished from underneath her filled her lungs. Or, it would have, if striking the ground (insofar as the ground existed) hadn't immediately driven it out of her again as Cardinal's hands cloased about her windpipe. The sudden, animal fear in her violet eyes was visible for just a moment as the remaining plasma sailed off into the nether and dissipated, plunging them both into darkness. It was like a nightmare had come true. Why - again with my mech-! Fragments of thoughts skittered through her head as she struggled beneath her much larger opponent. Her own tears leaked out of her eyes, tracing back along her chin or rolling down her neck to stop on Cardinal's fingers. Hiroki's hands, still soft and delicate and thoroughly untempered pushed against Cardinal's chest weakly as she kicked her legs.

 

I-I have to - have to think - why is this - is this really how - but I tried so hard - Her physical scrabbling was matched by what happened in her head, as Hiroki tried to pull together her thoughts with a rapidly dwindling oxygen supply. The terror and the crushing feeling of defeat threatened to overwhelm her at this cruel reminder of who and what she really was beneath the armor. The pale-haired girl eventually managed to think enough to change her approach to trying to pry Cardinal's arms apart, make it harder for her to maintain the terrible pressure on her neck, knowing full well she had no hope of winning a physical altercation. She could merely delay the inevitable.

[Shamitako]

Hiroki's attempts to escape seemed futile at first, but when she tried to pry Cardinal off she nearly succeeded. Although the False God was older and bigger, she was surprisingly weak, even compared to Hiroki. Hiroki might have broken free had Cardinal just a little less will to follow through with her attack. But in the end, Hiroki's struggles were in vain. Cardinal wasn't just going to win, she was going to kill Hiroki.

 

Light filled the room, illuminating the horrific scene. Cardinal's grip relaxed a bit as she turned to see the source, and then she let go entirely upon spotting Watcher standing there. "Gramps, you came to save me! I knew you would come." relief flooded through not only her voice, but her entire body.

 

"Belial, do you remember what I told you about alignments?" Watcher responded in a distant tone.

 

"Of course I do! Of course, of course." Cardinal sounded frantic, her mind slipping as she tried to avoid acknowledging to herself what she had just tried to do.

 

"Then you should already know: I never save anyone." Watcher grabbed Cardinal and deftly tossed her across the room, defying her Null Dimension to follow the toss with a beam of scorching light that blew off a chunk of her hair. It was too precise to be a miss, but even a warning shot from Watcher was enough to instill unimaginable fear. Unable to maintain her composure, Cardinal released her signature.

 

Cardinal tried to speak, but the feelings of betrayal had mixed with the sickening feeling of trying to kill Hiroki into a paralyzing panic that caused her to merely blubber incoherently.

 

Ignoring the trembling Cardinal, Watcher looked to Hiroki on the ground. "I'm sorry about that, I didn't expect her to take things so far. But she's at her limit now, you can finish her off." Lies of course, from the start he had been conditioning Cardinal to snap. Now Hiroki wasn't fighting to save the world, she was fighting for her life. With that kind of motivation, she would surely be able to overcome any limit. All that remained was to ensure her victory.

[Chevaleresse]

Hiroki coughed and gasped as soon as Cardinal was removed from her throat; she barely saw what went on afterward, although what she heard told her enough. She would have laid on the ground longer if her mech hadn't resummoned itself, defaulting to an attempt to hover that slowly brought her back up onto her feet. Even if her lungs still burned and her still ached, the Hellfire Knight was ready for battle once more, having come out of the temporary limbo it had been banished to none the worse for wear. 

 

The massive armored frame turned towards Cardinal; numerous indicators lit up across Hiroki's visor as her guns acquired target locks. They hummed ominously, preparing to fire as if Hiroki's shock, fear, and anger was powering them directly. Hiroki panted as she glared at her attacker through the visor; in the near-total darkness, the soft reddish glow inside the helmet itself was enough to make her face visible, if one were to look hard enough. 

 

"I refuse."

 

Cardinal had just tried to kill her. She took advantage of the fact that her opponent was just a frightened girl who was in far over her head, both metaphorically and literally. But Hiroki had come here with a mission, and a goal. The mission had been given to her by someone she hardly knew, of course, but the one thing she'd never wavered in was her pursuit of her goals. She would keep fighting, and keep winning. Every single opponent she'd fought so far had been defeated by nothing but her expertise, her skill, and her will to win. And now. . . she was supposed to execute someone who wasn't even in a mech, someone who had been crippled by a third party, who was sitting there incoherent with fear.

 

"I came here to save Tempest." She spoke slowly, deliberately, forcing herself to enunciate each word without halting. "I was going to defeat Cardinal. I didn't." She pointed with her main cannon at Watcher. "You ended this fight, so I . . . failed." A bit of heat entered her voice. "You took that chance from me." 

[Shamitako]

Oh, plan A then. Watcher chuckled internally. Hiroki was the stubborn type, he'd known that all along, but he had to admit he didn't think she had the guts to back it up. Now that she had proved him wrong, this would be much easier. "Is that so?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at the cannon in his face, "You came here to save Tempest? You don't even know what that means. But go ahead, pull the trigger, take revenge for your stolen glory. Just make sure that your pride is worth it. After all, I told you earlier: Your choices don't matter, I've already won."

 

Watcher fell back into character with ease. After countless times through this exact same scenario, it was child's play. He'd thought that returning home would be more difficult, but it seemed this world was just like all the rest. Really he should have just done this from the start.

[Chevaleresse]

"Why would I do that?" Hiroki let the cannon fall to its resting position at her side. "I don't care, um, about glory. I just want to win, and I can't." Her voice faltering somewhat was audible even through the tinny filter of her mech's intercom. He'd already made that quite clear. Hiroki was stubborn and probably foolhardy by a few measures, but she wasn't stupid. If Watcher was goading her into attacking, then he stood to benefit from it; either the fight would be a sham and her victory would be meaningless alongside furthering whatever ends he had, or he would effortlessly crush her after ripping her power away from her forever. 

 

The Knight shifted in place, bringing Hiroki to face Cardinal once again. The woman had tried to kill her - but supposedly her life depended on it. If Watcher's intervention hadn't been quite so dramatic, if she'd broken free on her own, maybe she would have acted before thinking, maybe done the same thing. "I told you," she said to the False God simply. "I said, um, I didn't want to fight. And that he would do, um, something like this."

[Shamitako]

Cardinal's mind was racing, a whirlwind of emotions and failures to rationalize them. She couldn't accept what had just happened, all of it was just too much for her. She couldn't understand what she had done wrong. She called him gramps, but in truth Watcher was more like a father to her. He wouldn't have betrayed her for no reason. More than that, as far as Cardinal was concerned, he hadn't truly betrayed her at all. If he had acted against her, it was her fault, she had done something to incur his wrath. But what? 

 

Not even acknowledging Hiroki, her eyes pleaded with Watcher. She just wanted to know what she had done wrong. But the eyes looking back at her were cold, she would not get her answer so easily.

 

Cardinal cast her gaze downwards, feeling defeated. But then it came to her. This was just like before, with Tai. She had lashed out against Watcher's wishes, and he had chastised her. Despite him warning her time and time again, she'd gone too far, and this was her punishment. 

 

"I'm sorry." she mumbled solemnly, knowing it couldn't possibly be enough, "I'm sorry. I should have listened."

[Chevaleresse]

"Why?" Hiroki almost startled herself as he asked the question out loud. "He just, um, attacked you. He brought me here to beat you." "Whatever Watcher wants of you, do the opposite." If she needs to prove herself to the Planes. . . Why would defeating Hiroki do that? She was just a tournament fighter, not a god. And the gods certainly didn't fear her; she'd willingly become a pawn in their plans in order to get a chance to prove her own power. However, there was someone here they did fear, someone who both they and she were unable to defeat. "If you need, um, to prove yourself. . . fight him. You're the only one that can."

[Shamitako]

Cardinal's eyes darted to Hiroki, but she didn't fully look up. Somehow she'd forgotten that the Hellfire Knight was there. She didn't really want to stand up to Watcher. Her punishment was deserved. Giving in to anger and resentment was what had drawn his ire in the first place, using it against him would just make things worse. 

 

"No, I can't." she said, her voice surprisingly firm, "Even if I wanted to, he could kill us both with a flick of his wrist. I don't care if you want to finish me off or fight him, either way I don't deserve to do anything."

[Chevaleresse]

"Then what, um, are you going to do?" Hiroki felt at her throat almost unconsciously. A part of her still said she should just take the easy way out and finish off Cardinal as both of the others there suggested. But then, both were her opposition, so why would she do what they wanted? "You said, um, you have nothing to lose. And. . . I can't do anything to him." It hurt to say that out loud, to admit her own weakness, but she couldn't deny it. "I don't, um, know what happens if nobody wins here. But I don't think it's, um, good. And I can't do anything any more." Hiroki sighed, and sat down. It really was lost, wasn't it? She couldn't do what Watcher wanted, and convincing Cardinal to stand up for herself hadn't worked. She was powerless, once again. Standing against Watcher herself would mean losing the only thing she had to hold onto. "It's up to you. But. . . sometimes, um, even if you don't think you deserve something, you need to push for it anyway. That's how, um, I got here." 

[Shamitako]

Watcher's patience was at its limit. He had been standing there, waiting for Hiroki to do something, but she seemed to not only have chosen to do fuck all, but she had also decided to outright give up. It was disappointing to say the least. He had expected her to succeed, he had thought she had spirit, and that she would be able to blaze a trail not just for Cardinal, but for all of Tempest. But she was being so absurdly cautious, trying her hardest to defy him, trying to win a mind game that didn't exist. Had he really screwed up that badly? Was he too villainous? Too strong? Too ambiguous? Watcher had failed before, the occasional failure was inevitable. But this time was personal, it was his last chance to undo his very first failure. He sighed internally. It looked like there was only one thing left for him to do, the one thing he knew for certain he would never fail at.

 

Wordlessly, Watcher reached behind him. Cracks began to form in the wall, bright light shining through. They multiplied and grew as Watcher curled his fingers inwards, climaxing when his hand clenched fully into a fist. Then he ripped it forwards, tearing open the wall behind him with an explosive flash of light. When the dust cleared, everything was black once more. Everything save for the wall, which had become something beyond darkness, a true nothingness that mortal minds could only hope to perceive.

 

"No." Cardinal moaned weakly as he tore a hole in her final glimmer of hope.

 

Watcher ignored her, reaching instead for the wall to his right. This was his own final glimmer of hope. He might have been useless in every other regard, but when it came to destruction, the Prince of Light was unparalleled. As before, he curled his fingers and cracks of light began to form in the wall.

[Chevaleresse]

Time seemed to slow as Watcher began to rip Cardinal's domain to shreds. Hiroki gasped at the sight, feeling more powerless than ever.

 

Wait.

 

That's what it always was, wasn't it? Feeling too weak and useless to do anything, feeling like she was going to lose what little she'd scraped together for herself. The fear of defeat and fading once more into irrelevancy. The thing she'd almost been consumed by time and time again. Not any more.

 

The girl stood up as Cardinal cried out. By the time Watcher raised his arm, she was sprinting at him full tilt. I did the impossible before, I can do it again. She shot the God of Nil one last glance as she ran, eyes wide with the fear she pushed back for the action she took to break the stare. Hiroki leapt forward at Watcher, reaching for him with her left hand outstretched, and summoned her mech, it's dark metallic shell wrapping around her as she tried to seize Watcher and grab him, throw him, anything to fight back against him regardless of how futile it felt.

[Shamitako]

Hiroki's charge caused Watcher a moment's hesitation as his more rational mind tried to pull him back from the brink. And then the destructive instinct that drove him pushed harder. He swung his hand over to face Hiroki, tearing down the second wall as he went. That hesitation was enough though, and Hiroki easily landed her grab. The impact knocked the air out of Watchers lungs and broke a couple of his ribs. Knowing that the pain would easily disable him, Watcher sent a precise surge of energy through his own body, incinerating the nerves that would otherwise have filled his mind with agony.

 

At the same time that he defended himself against pain, Watcher lashed out to inflict some on Hiroki. His outstretched hand surged with power and a beam of white fired out of it towards the Hellfire Knight's visor. Flimsy as his attack was, it was fueled by destruction, and thus was more than enough to completely blow off the left side of Hiroki's helmet and burn a trail of pure pain through her face, though she would physically be fine. If Hiroki were able to maintain her senses through the attack, she might take note of the fact that the attack wasn't hot like its appearance might suggest, but instead felt more like a tearing sensation, as though Watcher's light was ripping her face apart piece by piece.

[Chevaleresse]

Once again, Hiroki's body lit up with pain, the feeling of whatever Watcher had just done radiating from her now-exposed face through her entire being. She gasped through clenched teeth, but didn't allow herself to falter for more than a moment. She'd been subjected to this over and over, and she refused to let the pain rule over her. This needed to end, and end quickly, because her armor wasn't enough to stop. . . whatever it was that Watcher did, that felt like it shredded things at the atomic level. 

 

Hiroki continued to squeeze down with her grip, doing her best to stop the man from escaping. She kicked off the ground and her thrusters came to life, creating a pinwheel of fire as she did a full flip in place to slam Watcher against the ground and drag him along it to stun him further. She wouldn't toss him as originally planned; she had no idea what his range was, and didn't relish the thought of allowing him to collect himself by opening the distance between them up. Her guns angled and tilted, straining to bring themselves in line with Watcher; if she managed to maintain that grip, she would hold him out far enough to get her shoulder cannons to bear while her "wings" wrapped around to barrage him in a wide arc.

[Shamitako]

Watcher didn't get a chance to feel what Hiroki had done to him, as he preemptively cut off all feeling in his entire body. But not feeling it wasn't enough, because he absolutely heard the sound of something snapping and he most definitely saw his arm moving in a way it wasn't supposed to. The force of spin had caused his free arm to fling out, and it had broken like a twig.

 

Blood spilled from a multitude of cuts and scratches he sustained from the move, and he even coughed some up to drive the point home that she had done a number on him internally as well. Curiously, his blood wasn't red, but rather the same white color as the energy he attacked with, and it seemed to share in destructive potential as it began to cut like acid through everything it landed on. 

 

Spoiler

 

Watcher had a counter planned, but the final stage of Hiroki's attack changed his mind. Allowing his body to hang limply, he took the full force of all of her guns firing. But rather than cloak him in a raging inferno, the plasma stopped just before getting to him. It began to spin around him, coalescing into a disk which slowly spiraled inwards until it was harmlessly absorbed. There was a pause as Watcher composed himself, and then a burst of light exploded out of him, obliterating the Hellfire Knight's arm. 

 

Smirking casually, Watcher floated up into the air, a corona of light framing him giving the appearance of an angel. Strands of light stitched across his injured arm, bringing it back under his control.

 

A burst of energy brought a weapon to Watcher's hand, a black trident that stood in contrast to his otherwise completely white getup. He pointed the trident at Hiroki, and loosed another attack in her direction. This time it wasn't simply a blast of raw destructive power, but instead loose bolts of power that looked like arcing electricity. They attacked the Hellfire Knight seemingly at random, taking off small chunks wherever they landed.